The woke United Church of Christ denomination has passed a resolution that denounces so-called “domestic terrorism” by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents, based on accusations that the Trump Administration was using ICE to exploit or subvert the Constitution.
For background, in July 2025, the United Church of Christ (UCC) denomination met for its General Synod and passed a resolution denouncing immigration raids by ICE, which it described as “domestic terrorism.” The resolution, titled “Responding to the federal government’s attack on immigrants, migrants, and refugees,” also describes immigrants as being under “extreme threat” from the Trump administration.
Speaking to Religion News Service, UCC pastor Clara Sims said that the resolution was a response to concerns about the immigrant community, saying, “Our faith has always called us into spaces of risk on behalf of the vulnerable,” adding, “especially when people are being made vulnerable by really corrupt systems of power.”
Furthermore, Abigail Cipparone, a domestic policy advocate for the UCC, said that there was “pretty significant concern surrounding human rights violations that have been going on” in ICE detention centers, adding, “It is important for us to rededicate ourselves to protecting immigrants and refugees, also because of our call as Christians.”
Importantly, the UCC resolution describes the Trump administration as being guilty of “abuse and misuse of the Alien Enemies Act,” along with “denial of the constitutional right to due process for immigrants summarily deported or indefinitely detained.” In addition, the UCC formally denounced “domestic terrorism carried out by ICE agents working without uniforms, wearing masks or refusing to identify themselves.”
Moreover, the resolution calls for UCC churches to “pray with and serve immigrants, migrants and refugees, as well as speak prophetically, even as they face extreme threat by the federal government, as well as certain state and local governments, putting at risk the safety of their place of worship, their financial stability, and their very existence.”
In addition, the resolution describes the present moment as being one of “heightened racist, anti-Black, anti-Indigenous, anti-transgender, anti-immigrant sentiment and xenophobia, as immigration laws are
weaponized primarily against marginalized communities,” going on to blame the Trump Administration for “attempts by the federal government to violate the basic human rights of immigrants, migrants, and refugees.”
On its website, the UCC describes itself as declaring “welcome and inclusion of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender (LGBT), same gender loving (SGL) persons into the full life and ministry of the church.” In addition, the church has published a blog post on explicitly being “woke,” stating, “In the minds of some, ‘woke culture’ is a pejorative label attached to everything from police reform to transgender equality.”
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