Our Immigration Story
+ Pr. Steven Olson, Our Savior's, Albany
In 1974, I married my wife, a Canadian in Canada. I was a university student at the time and had insufficient means to guarantee my wife's support. So her father, made the guarantee and with relatively little time, paper work and frustration. My wife became a landed immigrant. We lived in Minnesota, where Diane was employed and we began our family.

In 1982, as I began my senior year at seminary, we took out a mortgage to buy a farm, believing that a pastor should have some real estate. That was a time when most parishes still offered parsonages.

In 1983, I received a call in April of my senior year at seminary to a church in Canada. With a guarantee of employment, once again the immigration process took relatively little time, paper work and frustration. So I was in Canada within two months after I received the letter of call and began the immigration process. Throughout the time we were in Canada, we filed US taxes every year, and continued to manage our farm from a distance.

In 2004, with our children now living in the states, we accepted a call to return to Minnesota. Based on past experience we thought the move across the border would be easy. However, after 9-11, that all changed. On extending the call, Bishop Jon asked if there was anything he could do to help. I replied "I will need a little help with the immigration process, but it shouldn't be too difficult."

Shortly later, I was surprised by a call from our bishop telling me "We have got a problem" He had been informed that the average processing time for a well-qualified immigrant with employment waiting was 640 days. That was nearly two years. I, of course, as a US citizen could cross the border at any time, but my wife would not be allowed even to visit the States during the immigration process. Knowing that I did not want to leave my wife for nearly two years, I knew we could not make the move.
So I contacted the Bishop and the congregation to remove myself as a candidate. Fortunately, my church in Canada was more then eager to have me stay. I thought that would be the end of the story.

Bishop Jon, though, with the help of the congregation, began to cut through the bureaucratic tape using their contacts in Washington on both sides of the aisle. Working together they managed to cut the time down from 2 years to 6 months. So I was able to accept the call with the understanding that I would come when the immigration process was complete.

Now began the challenging part. There is only one US consulate in Canada. That is in Montreal. Fortunately, that was only a six hour drive away. For people in western Canada, it would have been a greater hardship.

Fees for the paper work came to $1,450 for Diane to become a landed immigrant. In addition there were multiple trips to Montreal, which required overnight stays. This added another $1,500 in out-of-pocket expenses.

Finally though, we were invited for a final interview. On the table between us and the immigration official was Diane's file. It was a stack of papers about the size of two Twin Cities telephone books. What on earth could they have come up with to fill such a massive dossier? I know of the background checks with the law enforcement agencies of every community Diane and I had lived in over our marriage and in our life before. I knew of the FBI and Royal Canadian Mounted Police back ground reports. I knew of the papers we had filed along with the medical reports, but that could only have been a small portion of what lay before us.

To say the background investigation and vetting was extensive would be the grossest of understatements, and that was for a Lutheran Pastor's wife who had previously lived in the states, who owned land in the states, who had children and grand-children in the states, and who had a social security number and had filed taxes every year

What is more, all that was just to get in the door.

Once we got here, she still had to get a work permit and then she had to wait years before she could apply to be a citizen. Finally, in 2011, after nearly seven years our journey was complete. On July 15, 2011, Diane along with over a thousand others took the oath of citizenship.

If anyone thinks the path to citizenship is easy, I would ask you to think again. The truth is that if the same standards had been applied to our ancestors that were applied to Diane and me, most of us would still be living in Europe.

As for those coming into our country from developing nations, I have no idea how they manage it. The cost alone would be a nearly insurmountable barrier for most. When we add in the travel requirements, in most countries, it truly becomes a daunting task.

I do not know what the answer is, but the current system has become so burdensome that it is no wonder that there are so many illegal and undocumented immigrants. We used to be a country that welcomed the wretched masses of the world into a land of hope and promise.

That is no longer the case, and that makes me sad.