Theology and Migration

Ilsup Ahn’s Theology and Migration offers a Trinitarian approach to the world of human migration. The Triune nature of God, according to Ahn, provides a vantage point to construct a theology centered on the plight of migrants.

In this slim volume, Ahn first surveys the burgeoning literature on theology and migration. I will highlight his discussion of two scholars whose contributions continue to shape this field of study: Peter Phan and Daniel Groody. Ahn outlines the significance of Phan’s conception of the Christian God as Deus Migrator. According to Phan, “God possesses the characteristics commonly associated with migration and migrants” (7). The life of God resembles the life of migrants. Phan’s theology prods Ahn to turn to migration as the impetus for the church’s existence, and to turn to the experiential realities of migrants for a standpoint from which to know God. The epistemic priority of the migrant also features prominently in the work of Groody who, according to Ahn, articulates a Visio Dei theology. This “new way of looking at the world” (11) opens up possibilities for Ahn’s dialectical understanding of God and migrants—that the one has everything to do with the other. “A Trinitarian theology of migration becomes possible,” Ahn writes, “as we begin to see that the three sacred Persons (the Son, the Father, and the Holy Spirit) are distinctively yet intrinsically involved with the phenomenon of human migration” (20).

In part 2 he begins his constructive trinitarian project with Christology by linking the identity of Jesus to the experience of people who migrate. Like migrants, Jesus also suffered from the repressive violence of governing authorities. Jesus endured “state terror” as a result of his embodied proclamation of a “theopolitical migration,” which he called “the kingdom of God,” a reality that Ahn considers to be “quintessentially interrelated with the notion of migration” (31-32). He presents a version of Ignacio Ellacuría’s conception of the “crucified people”—that people who migrate experience the violence of the nation-state’s border security regimes as a kind of crucifixion (23). The borders of nation-states have become modern instances of Golgotha’s terror.

In part 3 he develops an apophatic vision of undocumented people as “the migrating gifts of God” in order to provide a counter-theology to the ideology of criminalization of unauthorized residents of the United States (41). Ahn turns to Catherine Keller’s apophatic relationalism: a “democracy of creatures” in which our recognition of an entangled world enables a culture of mutual exchange where political life coheres in the gifts that flow from each person’s identity, whether citizen or foreigner (53-54). To welcome each other into a polity, regardless of documentation status, is “the apophatic unfolding of forgiveness” (60). This has to do with the criminalization of migrants, Ahn argues, in that “no sin, crime, or debt is unforgivable by the grace of God” (61).

In part 4 he considers the doctrine of the Holy Spirit as relevant to human migration, the missio Spiritus as a source of insight into the theological status of people on the move. In other words, “how the Holy Spirit works in the process of human migration” as part of “a Trinitarian Pneumatology of migration” (62). He takes his cues from the Pentecostal scene in the New Testament book of Acts in order to characterize the Spirit as a ruptural happening—“a rip in the fabric of being,” borrowing from Alain Badiou’s philosophy of the event (68). The Spirit emerges as a figure that disrupts the dominant order in order to make room for ethnic and linguistic diversity. The Holy Spirit empowers the church to cross borders to spread the gospel of Jesus, and Ahn argues that this phenomenon of migration is a pneumatological activity—that migrants are signs of the Spirit’s movement (73).

Ahn concludes his argument in Part 5 by extending his Trinitarian approach to consider the theme of ecclesiology. He envisions “a Trinitarian ecclesiology” that would “promote inclusion, diversity, and solidarity, which is distinguished from the secular politics [of] hegemonic power and party interests” (82-83). Early Christianity provides an “ideal type” for organizing a “church on the move,” where people embodied God’s gracious economy of forgiveness, of inclusivity of otherness, which should inspire forms of life that deconstruct the “closed binary” between citizens and non-citizens (87, 90). To fill out this ecclesial proposal, Ahn points to the Sanctuary Movement, where churches have provided undocumented immigrants protection from federal deportation (97).

Surprisingly, Ahn does not engage in much Trinitarian theology. His focus is migrants not the Trinity. Trinitarian language, it seems, is added for the purpose of providing theological weight to his socio-political concern. In other words, “Trinitarian” is a way for him to say something like, “This should really matter for the Christian faith.” A Trinitarian argument would have involved, at least, a rationale for his account of the triune persons as distinctive agents in the world, which puts his position at odds with the traditional rule of thumb regarding trinitarian relations: Opera trinitatis ad extra indivisia sunt (“the outward works of the Trinity are undivided”). While the three persons are distinguishable among themselves, the works of the Trinity toward the world are indivisible. Ahn, however, assumes the opposite: “to see that the three sacred Persons (the Son, the Father, and the Holy Spirit) are distinctively yet intrinsically involved with the phenomenon of human migration” (20). He distinguishes one trinitarian person from another, and assigns each of them a distinctive role in his theology of migration. “I have sketched a new Trinitarian theology of migration by exploring the tripartite practical-theological significance of Trinitarian revelations: the salvific ministry of Jesus Christ, the gift-giving grace of God, and the reconciling works of the Holy Spirit” (82): Salvation as the work of Christ, gift-giving as the work of the Father (I assume), and reconciliation as the work of the Spirit.

Ahn prods the reader to make theological connections to the political situation of global migration. It remains unclear whether “new” formulations of trinitarian relations will produce the collective desire to reconfigure our politics for the sake of the well-being of migrants.

Isaac S. Villegas is a PhD student in religion at Duke University.

Isaac Villegas

Date Of Review:

February 26, 2024