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The pastor Whit Hutchinson on Thursday lifted a pen in the air and proclaimed: "This is all that is needed to hold together the families of immigrants."

He said that Barack Obama should use the same day he assumes office as president, Jan. 20, to sign an executive order to halt the deportations of immigrants.


"This is so easy that it might do so in the inaugural parade route to his government," said the pastor of the Wesley United Methodist Church in Washington.

Hutchinson was one of seven religious leaders in a joint presentation to reporters, announced their participation in the campaign for immigrant advocacy groups to revive the debate on immigration reform.


In New York, religious and municipal leaders on Thursday joined a national campaign to require Obama to remove the raids and deportations immediately and return to the reform of immigration laws during the first 100 days of his mandate.

"The Church will not stay silent," he said in New York the Rev. Gabriel Salguero, representing the Confraternity Conciliar Leaders, which has 3,000 member churches. "We hope the commitment of the administration of Barack Obama when he said that there will be changes, we can. So we say 'yes you can' stop the raids until we reform the system."


The Hispanic councilman Melissa Mark-Viverito announced Saturday that hundreds of citizens and legal residents may go to a church in the Latin Quarter of East Harlem to explain the situation of undocumented friends or family members who fear being deported. Their stories will be recorded and documented for more than 50 volunteers and delivered to Congress as Hispanic Nydia Velazquez, who will attend the event and in turn, deliver to the future Obama administration.

"All of us here understand that our immigration system is broken and that existing laws destroy entire families," said Mark-Viverito. "We must fight for this country commitment to human rights and seek justice for the hundreds of thousands of workers and families who suffer discrimination and violence."


Among those present at the ceremony, held at the mayor of New York, was the Rev. Walter Coleman, the Adalberto United Methodist Church in Chicago, who two years ago housed Elvira Arellano, the immigrant refugee who lived in the church to avoid deportation, and that became a symbol of the suffering of the undocumented.

In a separate conference call broadcast in Washington, Janet Murguia, president of the National Council of La Raza, said that more than 10 million Hispanics voted in elections that gave victory to Obama did so "dissatisfied" with the failed attempts reform.


He said that in the past four years had a 40% increase in racist incidents against Latinos, and many of those killed were involved. "This must stop," he said.

The leaders announced January 21 for a concentration of at least 5,000 people in the southeast Washington to march on the offices of the immigration police and customs, known as ICE.


Rabbi David Shneyer, director of the Sanctuary Kol Am, said the repressive attitude of the authorities against illegal immigrants was inconsistent in a country like the United States than in all their actions, even in words printed on its currency, trust in God.

"The Bible speaks many times about the treatment that should be welcoming to outsiders," he said. "We said that we should not only welcome but we must protect them and treat them as part of God's creation, but in this country we are giving this treatment of compassion and justice."


Leaders of another group of activists met on Wednesday with members of Obama's transition team to discuss the need for reform, and the Senate has included among the 10 priority items of its agenda this year's debate on immigration.