Teacher, I do not know if I can come in today. There are a lot of new flags outside and my wife does not want to be left alone when I go to English class.”
This is one of the many messages that I received, and it is representative of those I still receive now, from asylum seekers and refugees who have attended our community English class since the summer of 2024.
To give the comment some context, following a horrific attack in Southport, England, agitators falsely blamed an asylum seeker, sparking nationwide riots [1].
Although Scotland, with the exception of a few isolated and poorly attended events, largely escaped the physical violence in 2024’s “summer of discontent” [2], it was palpable that something had shifted. Violence directed at migrants had been justified, regardless of the truth [3]. With discontent about migration becoming more prominent in public life, and elections looming, there has been political jockeying among the main political parties about being “tough on immigration.” In this “hostile environment” [4], the use of dehumanizing language about migrants has flung the Overton window open, legitimizing extreme rhetoric and aggression in our communities [5]. The symbol of the Scottish flag (the “Saltire,” the white St. Andrew’s cross on a blue background)—often unfurled for sporting events, political rallies, and, since 2015, a banner championing the inclusion of “New Scots” [6] — has recently been utilized to communicate anti-immigrant sentiment, when Saltires were tethered to lamp posts in areas housing refugees and asylum seekers [7]. Despite efforts to keep the Saltire from becoming co-opted in this manner [8], for the migrants who live in these communities, the meaning of the symbol has become tarnished, and undoing this is no easy task.
I coordinate the refugee and asylum program with the Glasgow East End Nazarene churches. In the aftermath of the riots, violent rhetoric, and, in extreme cases, assault directed at by the migrants we serve, we were forced to ask: how do
we communicate welcome and hospitality? How do we show that our church is a place of sanctuary (both to those who need it, and those who would work against it)?
For us, it started with a simple gesture. At the door of the church, we set up a whiteboard sign that read, “Everybody is welcome in our community!” One of our neighbors from Sudan asked if he could write “welcome” in Arabic on the sign: ahlan wa sahaln. Seeing this, others began adding “welcome” in their own languages and continue to do so, It now offers “welcome” in more than ten langagues, bienvenido, laskavo prosymo, soo dhowow, hoş geldin, bakhêr-bêt, khosh âmadi… A sign is just a sign, but one that we hoped publicly communicated that the church was a place of sanctuary for all. Of course, not everyone loved it. While I was teaching English, I saw some young men nick the sign, and I later had to fish it out of a dumpster after class. As signs do, it came to communicate something of the core values and ethic of collaboration that undergird our various programs of community outreach: English classes, food provision, advocacy, and pastoral support.
In the most recent edition of the Gaelic Bible, an interesting translation choice appears in Philippians 3:20:
Oir tha an t-saoranas againne air nèamh, om bheil dùil againn cuideachd ri Slànaighear, an Tighearna Ìosa Crìosd (ATN2017) [9].
“But our citizenship is in heaven, and it is from there that we are expecting a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ” (NRSVue).
Rather than using the conventional, bureaucratic Gaelic term for citizenship, the translators chose instead to render the Greek politeuma (often glossed in English as “citizenship”) with saoranas. Etymologically, it is a modification abstract noun for “freedom” and here used to express the ancient link between citizenship and the status of a free person [10]. This is a rich translation of Paul’s message to the Philippians, that says something of the first century context with Roman limits on citizenship and the pervasiveness of slavery [11], as well as speaking to the transcendent and transgressive nature of God’s kingdom. When our Scottish church embodies saoranas, the church becomes a space, a sanctuary, where boundaries are traversed through belonging to Christ. As the New Testament scholar Alex Muir has argued, although Paul’s language in Philippians employs Roman political vocabulary it points to something beyond the present reality: “what matters presently is the heavenly location of both saviour and citizenship” [12].
For migrants and asylum seekers who often lack legal standing or have insecure status, the church seeks to reflect something of that heavenly saoranas, the recognized status, privilege, dignity, and belonging of being a free member of a heavenly polity that is offered to us by the salvific hospitality of God, which is embodied in the church’s praxis of sanctuary [13].
This perspective does not mean that I, or the church, have the liberty to ignore contemporary questions of national identity or symbols, or retreat into a detached heavenly perspective. These issues matter deeply to our daily lives and to those whom we serve. As Scottish parliamentary elections loom, we are called to be involved, to make decisions, and to advocate in line with these values. As the prophet Jeremiah writes, “seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you… for in its welfare you will find your welfare” (Jer. 29:7, NRSVue). These words were addressed to exiles, to those who were politically and socially disenfranchised. Yet, a Christian political ethic is not one that forces a false partisan conformity, but our discussions of political matters should be grounded in the values of the kingdom to which we claim ultimate allegiance. From a shared basis of values, we can have a more fruitful approach to our political differences in a fraught and fractious context. The improvised, multilingual welcome sign was just a sign, but it also communicated that in the midst of the hostile environment, we cultivate a sanctuary where migrants are not only welcomed and valued, but we are in turn welcomed by them [14].
If we can bring together Philippians 3:20 and Jesus’s exemplary prayer in Matthew 6:10, as we gaze toward a heavenly saoranas, we are called to live in light of its eventual consummation. In welcoming migrants in the church, offering sanctuary, we are drawn closer to the God we claim to worship. This is beautifully expressed in the song “Citizens” by Jon Guerra:
Coming to you for the mothers
Who are all running for cover
There is a flood from their weeping
Tell me you won’t make them go
I need to know there is justice
That it will roll in abundance
And that you’re building a city
Where we arrive as immigrants
And you call us citizens
And you welcome us as children home.
We are reminded that our saoranas is not of this world. Those who cross the boundaries of our nation-states, and those who have direct experience as “aliens and strangers” (Eph. 2:19), can remind us of and draw us to live with this fundamental Christian identity.
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Footnotes:
[1] Ewan Gawne, Laura O’Neill, and Angela Ferguson, “Community in mourning after three girls killed in knife attack,” BBC News, July 30, 2024, https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cd194zkw4d9o; Dan Milmo and Ben Quinn, “How false online claims about Southport knife attack spread so rapidly,” The Guardian, July 31, 2024, https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/article/2024/jul/31/how-false-online-claims-about-southport-knife-attack-spread-so-rapidly.
[2] “Riots engulf Britain” and “summer of discontent,” BBC News, August 4, 2024, http://bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cn38852jgr2o. It is worth noting here, in case it is seen as an omission, that my article was written just prior to the recent unrest in the UK in 2026. There were further riots in the UK after the sentencing of Henry Nowak’s murderer, Vickrum Singh Digwa (Stuart Rust, “Henry Nowak case: What happened and why has it caused national outrage?” BBC News, June 5, 2026, https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cpvpv2xylgeo) and the attempted murder of Stephen Ogilvie by Hadi Alodid, a Sudanese refugee (Rory Carroll, “How the Belfast stabbing was the spark to a fuse loaded with grievance and provocation,” The Guardian, June 11, 2026, https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2026/jun/11/how-the-belfast-stabbing-was-the-spark-to-a-fuse-loaded-with-grievance-and-provocation). These were isolated incidents, but both the sentencing of Digwa and Alodid’s attack happened less than a week apart. Nowak’s tragic murder and mistakes in policing fueled outrage over perceptions of “two-tier policing” (shorthand for the allegation that ethnic minorities receive preferential treatment by police); the arrest of Alodid erupted into violence aimed generally at immigrants regardless of legal status, which started in Belfast but spread to some areas in Glasgow (James Delaney and Iona Young, “Protests across Scotland follow Belfast knife attack,” BBC News, June 10, 2026, https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/crkv44yx7e5o). This recent spate of national unrest is not the subject of this paper, but it displays a similar pattern of far-right activism capitalizing on tragedy; both Nowak’s and Ogilvie’s families expressed that they did not want their tragedies exploited for violence and division. Perceptions of threat related to immigration are easily manipulated, despite official statistics showing a reduction in violent crime in Belfast and no increase attributed to immigration (Police Service of Northern Ireland, “Police Recorded Crime in Northern Ireland Update to 31st March 2026,” PSNI Statistics Branch, May 14, 2026; Andrew Madden, “Fact v myth: Vast majority of crime here committed by white ‘locals,’” Belfast Telegraph, June 11, 2026, https://pressreader.com/article/281543707613689). There is a sad irony that during the Belfast riots, many protesters held signs that read “Women and Children Not Safe in this Area.” Indeed, Northern Ireland is the most unsafe place in the UK to be a woman (Susan Lagdon, Marcin Owczarek, Claire McCartan, Ngozi Anyadike-Danes, Mark Shevlin, and Julie-Ann Jordan, “Every Voice Matters! Violence Against Women in Northern Ireland,” Ending Violence Against Women and Girls Report, 2023; Sara Girvin and Abigail Taylor, “Why is Northern Ireland ‘UK’s most dangerous place to be a woman’?” BBC News, March 29, 2026, https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/clyxexlkgd1o), but this cannot be attached to immigration. If protection of women and children was the real justification for the riots, there was a curious lack of street violence after the conviction of Jeffrey Donaldson (a former leader of the Democratic Unionist Party) for the sexual abuse of children, (Julian O’Neill and Luke Sproule, “Ex DUP leader Donaldson guilty of child sex abuse charges including one of rape,” BBC News, June 22, 2026, https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c04yrvzkdqqo). It should also be recognized that despite the violence in 2026, many people joined anti-racism marches in opposition to far-right activity (Darran Marshall, “Thousands gather for anti-racism rally in Belfast after disorder,” BBC News, June 13, 2026, https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c20ygdde4djo; Daniel Lavelle and Geraldine McKelvie, “Far-right and anti-racist protesters clash in UK cities after Belfast riots,” The Guardian, June 13, 2026, https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2026/jun/13/far-right-anti-racist-protesters-clash-brighton-liverpool-sheffield-glasgow).
[3] Ed Thomas and Shayan Sardarizadeh, “How a deleted LinkedIn post was weaponised and seen by millions before the Southport riot,” BBC News, October 25, 2024, https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c99v90813j5o.
[4] The title of an official UK policy designed to make life so difficult for undocumented migrants that they would voluntarily leave the UK, see: Melanie Griffiths and Colin Yeo, “The UK’s hostile environment: Deputising immigration control,” Critical Social Policy 41, no. 4 (2021): 521-544.
[5] Steve Kirkwood, “The humanisation of refugees: A discourse analysis of UK parliamentary debates on the European refugee ‘crisis,’” Journal of Community & Applied Social Psychology 27, no. 2 (2017): 115–125; Paul Reilly, “Southport riots: why social media’s role in unrest is overblown,” The Conversation, August 1, 2024, https://theconversation.com/southport-riots-why-social-medias-role-in-unrest-is-overblown-235979.
[6] Scottish Government, New Scots refugee integration strategy 2024 (Edinburgh: Scottish Government, 2024), https://www.gov.scot/publications/new-scots-refugee-integration-strategy-2024/; for responses to the “New Scots” policy, both appreciative and critical, see: Alison Phipps, Esa Aldegheri, and Dan Fisher, “The New Scots Refugee Integration Strategy: A report on the local and international dimensions of integrating refugees in Scotland” (University of Glasgow, 2022); Emma Hill, “New Scots, Old Tricks?,” in Navigating the (Post) Colonial Pathways of Somali Migration to Scotland: Between the Edges of Empire (Cham: Springer Nature Switzerland, 2025, 117-139.
[7] Abbi Garton-Crosbie, “Outrage over ‘weaponisation’ of Saltire in campaign backed by far-right”, The National, September 1, 2025, https://www.thenational.scot/news/25429805.outrage-weaponisation-saltire-campaign-backed-far-righ/.; Libby Brooks and Severin Carrell, “’Reclaim our flag’: saltire becomes cultural battleground in Scotland as tensions rise over asylum housing,” The Guardian, September 6, 2025, https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025/sep/06/reclaim-our-flag-saltire-cultural-battleground-tensions-asylum-housing.
[8] Chris Leslie, “’Compassion is stronger than division’: Glasgow’s battle over the saltire”, The Guardian, October 13, 2025, https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025/oct/13/compassion-stronger-than-division-glasgow-battle-over-saltire-picture-essay’
[9] An Tiomnadh Nuadh anns an Eadar-Theangachadh Ùr Gàidhlig 2017 (United Kingdom: Comann Bhìoball na h-Alba, 2017).
[10] S.v. “saor,” Colin B. D. Mark, The Gaelic-English Dictionary (Oxford: Taylor & Francis, 2003), 906-7.
[11] Eric Noffke, “Citizenship in the New Testament,” Scriptura 124, no. 1 (2025): 1-18.
[12] Alex W. Muir, “’Our πολίτευμα Belongs in Heaven’ (Phil 3: 20): Comparing Paul’s and Seneca’s Narratives of Consolation,” Novum Testamentum 64, no. 2 (2022): 264; see also, Lynn Cohick, ‘Philippians and Empire’, in Scot McKnight and Joseph B. Modica (eds.), Jesus Is Lord, Caesar Is Not: Evaluating Empire in New Testament Studies (Downers Grove: IVP Academic, 2013), 166-182.
[13] For a robust biblical theological discussion of this concept, see: Joshua W. Jipp, Saved by Faith and Hospitality (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2017), 123-156.
[14] For more examples of how this has been has been done, especially in sport, see my article: See my article, Paul Wilson “How much evil he has done to your saints?’: Ananias, Saul, and a Christian Approach to the Contact Hypothesis in the Scottish Refugee Context,” Theology in Scotland, Vol. 32 No. 2 (2025), pp. 21-34.
The views and opinions expressed in this blog are those of the individual authors and do not necessarily reflect the official position of the Center for Public Theology & Migration. This platform exists to foster thoughtful theological reflection, dialogue, and public engagement on issues related to (im)migration.
About the top image: Photo by Paul Wilson
