All are welcome — except those we don’t like

This article originally appeared at Baptist News Global on November 12, 2025.

While white evangelicals like to brand their churches to their neighbors as cool and kind, their behavior toward their neighbors often is cruel. I recently came across a perfect example of this through the social media posts of Nate Schlomann, executive pastor of Village Church, a Reformed Baptist congregation near Richmond, Va.

“Trump is not deporting enough illegals or sending enough leftist judges to prison,” he posted on X in May. A few months earlier, he wrote, “Train yourself to be joyful when you see illegals crying. That is justice, and it must happen for Americans to afford a home.”

That’s quite a statement to read while we’re watching videos of ICE slamming into vehicles, ripping babies from their parents’ arms, pepper spraying randomly into cars, and pulling guns out as they kidnap people with no identification or warrant.

A brief survey of Schlomann’s social media feed found a whole slew of additional offensive posts about immigrants.

• “I will take your $2,000 checks if you agree to deport 20 million people by the end of the administration.”
• “What we want is 50 million people deported/remigrated.”
• “The evangelical elites don’t want you to know this, but you don’t have to feel bad about illegals getting justice as we defend our children’s future. You actually can just care about your kids without qualification and that’s OK.”
• “The illegals are destroying our country rapidly now and if you won’t say it, you are worse than an unbeliever. Open your eyes. A quick trip to the mall is all you need around here to see this is true. We’re in big trouble. If you’re afraid of being called a racist for talking about this, you hate our children.”
• “All this fuss, and we’re not deporting nearly enough people, and we’re being way too nice about it.”
• “Any means of deporting illegals is legal. They are not citizens.”

Just go to the mall, open your eyes, and you’ll know everyone’s legal status and that they’re destroying our country? Sure, that doesn’t sound racist at all. And if we call him out on it, then he thinks we hate kids.

Republican presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy speaks to guests at the Iowa Faith & Freedom Coalition Spring Kick-Off on April 22, 2023, in Clive, Iowa. (Photo by Scott Olson/Getty Images)

And it’s not just nonwhite people on the left he can’t seem to stand. It’s nonwhite people on the right as well. When the White House announced Vivek Ramaswamy was leaving DOGE, Schlomann posted, “Bye. America first means Americans first.”

This despite the fact that Ramaswamy was born and raised in Ohio.

But aren’t we supposed to welcome the stranger, a follower of Jesus reading Matthew 25 might ask.

“It is not loving to ‘welcome’ people whose illegal presence is hurting your children and neighbors in so many ways,” Schlomann retorts.

Continue reading at Baptist News Global.