As federal immigration raids continue in New York, New York, Episcopalians are supporting the city’s 3.1 million immigrants in different ways, like a recent pop-up legal clinic at St. Bartholomew’s Episcopal Church in Manhattan. Others have been protesting in rallies, like this Jan. 24 anti-immigration enforcement gathering at Union Square. Photo: Gabriele Holtermann/AP
[Episcopal News Service] As federal immigration enforcement raids continue in New York, St. Bartholomew’s Episcopal Church in Manhattan is committed to serving the approximately 3.1 million immigrants living in the largest U.S. city.
Earlier this month, the church hosted a free pop-up immigration legal clinic as part of a partnership with the Diocese of New York, the New York Legal Assistance Group and El Barrio Angels, an immigration social services ministry housed at the Church of St. Edward the Martyr in East Harlem. Altogether, 46 volunteers helped 15 asylum-seekers apply for federal work permits, which cost $560 per application.
“All of the people who showed up for the legal clinic were very happy and extremely appreciative given that the $560 fee would have prohibited most of them from being able to fill out the paperwork,” the Rev. Zack Nyein, St. Bartholomew’s senior associate rector and pastor of Imagine Worship, told Episcopal News Service.
Throughout the day, each volunteer served a different role ranging from assisting with legal paperwork to serving as a Spanish or French interpreter. Filling out the applications took about one hour per client because, according to Nyein, the legal jargon is “intentionally complicated.”
“The federal government doesn’t make the paperwork easy,” Nyein said. “It’s meant to be kind of obstructive.”
The Jan. 20 pop-up legal clinic was a project of St. Bartholomew’s Migrant Welcome Committee, a group of parishioners that provides immigration support through legal assistance, advocacy, education and other services.
Keith Reinhard, a member of St. Bartholomew’s Migrant Welcome Committee ministry, served as a Spanish interpreter at the pop-up clinic. He told ENS that the committee began planning the clinic after asking asylum-seekers and immigration partners how the church could help beyond immediate needs like food and clothing. The committee decided to plan the legal clinic after learning that the immigration work permit application costs hundreds of dollars, and partner organizations had no money to help cover the expenses.
“We had an opportunity to do three things: provide funds for these people so they could apply; provide space for them to fill out their applications; and help in the form of lawyers and interpreters,” Reinhard said. “I think it turned out really well.”
Money to cover the asylum-seekers’ application fees came from the Diocese of New York’s legal support fund, which launched in 2025.
Throughout the year, St. Bartholomew advocates for immigrants’ rights through its “postcard project” ministry. Parishioners purchase custom postcards from the church’s website and fill them with messages to local, state and federal legislators supporting or denouncing new immigration laws.
“Radical welcome and love of everyone are core values [of St. Bartholomew’s],” Reinhard said. “We believe that God calls us to love our neighbors and welcome the stranger, and we think that call means we can’t be mere bystanders when we see migrants being targeted, and we have to act.”
Volunteer parishioners also accompany people to their immigration hearings, where many people have been arrested or detained.
“It really is a ministry of witnessing,” Nyein said. “It’s impossible to actually intervene and stop detention from happening, but we feel it is important to continue to bear witness so that people know they’re not alone and that they’re seen.”
In the first six months of 2025, more people were arrested by federal immigration authorities in New York than in all of 2024, according to U.S. Customs and Enforcement data analyzed by NY1, a 24-hour cable news channel that covers all five New York boroughs.
Since the start of his second term in office last year, President Donald Trump’s administration has pursued aggressive deportation policies, targeting millions of people living in the United States without permanent legal residency status. ICE officers and U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents have so far arrested and detained tens of thousands of people, including legal U.S. residents with no criminal background.
In New York, 27% of people who’ve been apprehended are convicted criminals, according to NY1’s data analysis.
As of Jan. 8, 68,990 migrants and asylum-seekers were in ICE custody, according to the latest ICE and CBP data compiled by NBC News Service.
Two Episcopalians in the Diocese of New York, Elizabeth “Ketty” De Los Santos, an asylum-seeker from Peru and a parishioner at St. Bartholomew’s Episcopal Church in White Plains, and an unnamed member of the Church of St. Mary the Virgin in Manhattan, have been in ICE custody since summer 2025.
The surge in federal immigration enforcement in the last year has led to many protests by immigrants and allies in New York. On Jan. 27, 66 people were arrested at an anti-ICE protest at a Hilton Garden Inn hotel in Manhattan.
Nyein said St. Bartholomew’s efforts to support immigrants, including the recent pop-up immigration clinic, feel personal to him as the son of a Burmese immigrant.
“My father came to the United States after spending five years as a political prisoner in Myanmar. This country has really afforded me the opportunity to have a wonderful life, but I would not have been able to, had my father not been able to escape terror in Myanmar and make a life here in the United States,” Nyein said. “Our common life together would be severely diminished if all the immigrants in our communities disappear.”
-Shireen Korkzan is a reporter and assistant editor for Episcopal News Service. She can be reached at skorkzan@episcopalchurch.org.