Event Overview
Congregations form a valuable safe space for all people, and providing a welcoming environment for new neighbors in America comes with the responsibility of navigating the various topics that sometimes come into play when doing so. In an era of misinformation, it can be hard to get clear, legal facts from reliable sources, in order to lead and protect the community that exists within every congregation.
This workshop will provide an overview of how to make congregations welcoming to immigrants by learning how to be empathetic towards what affects them, and supporting them with resources such as the recently published Parish Toolkit by CLINIC. From equity costs, to education access, driver’s licenses and dealing with law enforcement, congregations will be given a comprehensive view of their ability to support those joining the United States as new residents.
Participants will learn:
- The laws and policies impacting immigrants and which have been recently passed in Indiana in the last two years.
- About protected areas and sensitive locations and how, the various rights that still protect us and our places of worship with examples of how to exert these rights.
- The basics that should go into an emergency plan for their congregation and for individual immigrants.
- To write policies and protocols for their spaces that delineate which areas are private and which are public.
- To create a model emergency plan for their own congregations and begin to form a plan for accompaniment.
About the Instructor:
Viviana Westbrook is a bilingual immigration attorney who has worked six years at the Catholic Legal Immigration Network (CLINIC) as the State and Local Advocacy Attorney. Prior to her work at CLINIC, Viviana obtained experience with various immigration non-profits in the DMV area including the Central American Resource Center, Amica Center, Kids in Need of Defense, Catholic Charities of Baltimore, and most recently she worked with survivors of gender-based violence at the Tahirih Justice Center.
In her current role, Viviana provides strategic and technical support to state and local-level immigrant advocates, State Catholic Conferences, diocesan agencies, religious communities, and community organizers in their work on immigrant-related state legislation, local ordinances, federal/state enforcement partnerships, as well as inclusion efforts. She provides state legislative analysis, ghostwrites testimony, holds strategy sessions, assists with coalition-building, drafts educational one-pagers, updates CLINIC’s Know Your Rights materials, develops other educational resources to protect immigrant communities, and provides lots of trainings.