On June 19, as Iran and Israel exchanged volleys of missiles and officials secretly finalized plans to dispatch American bombers to strike Iranian nuclear sites, pastor Ara Torosian published a letter to his church.
Torosian, an Iranian pastor at Cornerstone West Los Angeles, leads the church’s Farsi-speaking congregation. He came to the United States as a refugee 15 years ago after being imprisoned for his faith. He has always carried in his heart a prayer, Torosian wrote: “that Iran would be free.”
Now, explosions were rocking Tehran and other Iranian cities, wounding and killing children and grandparents, and Torosian was shouldering new burdens from halfway across the globe.
“There are people currently in Iran who were baptized in this very church and still listen to our sermons regularly. We are far from them,” Torosian wrote, urging Cornerstone’s English- and Spanish-speaking congregations to stand with and pray for the Persian worshipers. “We Farsi-speaking believers are living minute by minute with heavy hearts. We’re asking: Are our loved ones safe? Are they alive? What is happening to them?”
But five days later, the suffering of his loved ones came suddenly very close.
On Tuesday, the pastor recorded on his phone as masked federal immigration agents arrested two of his church members on a Los Angeles sidewalk. The Iranian husband and wife had pending asylum cases, according to Torosian. They fled Iran for fear of persecution for being Christians and had been part of his congregation for about a year.
The detentions add to a growing number of church members and Christians seeking religious protection who have been detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). Often they have no apparent criminal history. In many instances, they were in the United States lawfully, complying with orders from immigration courts. ICE has traditionally not deported individuals with pending asylum petitions, who are allowed to work while their cases proceed.
Earlier this week, according to Torosian, immigration agents arrested a separate Iranian Christian family who worshiped at Cornerstone. Ministry leaders told CT they have heard reports of other Iranians being detained in recent days. They echo stories of Iranian Christians the administration has already deported to countries such as Panama, where some remain.
Immigration arrests have shaken church communities across the country. In April, Kasper Eriksen, a Danish national and homeschooling father of four in Mississippi, was arrested at his final citizenship hearing after an apparent paperwork error. As of late May, he remained in ICE detention. “We have an army of prayer warriors fighting for us,” his wife Savannah, a US citizen, wrote in a fundraising appeal.
Also in April, pastor Maurilio Ambrocio was detained when he appeared for a routine check-in with ICE. He had lived in the United States for 20 years. The Tampa, Florida, church he ran served as a polling place. He was in the country illegally, was the explanation ICE gave for his arrest.
Not far away and around the same time, a small group leader and deacon at another Tampa church was taken by ICE. Gonzalo Antonio Segura was leaving home to go to work as a handyman on a Thursday morning in early April. Immigration agents met him at his car and detained him.
Ramon Nina, Segura’s pastor at Iglesia Comunidad de Fe, told CT that his phone rang at 7 a.m. during his early-morning prayer. It was Segura’s wife, distraught that agents had arrested her husband, leaving her alone with their two children. “I can’t erase those cries from my memory,” Nina said in Spanish. “He was very beloved, respected. Very servant hearted.”
Nina and the church hired a lawyer—another pastor in Florida—and together they drove up and down the state, trying to find Segura as he was moved between detention centers from Clearwater to Miami. No ICE facility would allow Nina a pastoral visit. Eventually Segura was transferred to Texas.
“My church is conservative. It votes conservative. But with what happened to Antonio, they all have come to the realization that this process that is being carried out is blatant. It’s discriminatory,” Nina said. Segura has been in the country for two decades. According to Florida state records, he was stopped once 17 years ago for driving without a license, a misdemeanor.
“He was undocumented. That was his crime, of course. But I think a man like this deserves a pardon. The president of the United States just pardoned a family that was found guilty of tax evasion,” Nina said, referencing the convicted businessman Paul Walczak.
In May and June, as the administration pushed to meet higher deportation goals, it began to detain more immigrants without criminal histories. According to government data, 65 percent of ICE “book-ins” at detention centers are not criminals. Only 7 percent are convicted of violent offenses.
The Department of Homeland security has said in court filings that it will prioritize deporting even immigrants who have had charges dismissed, and it has ended protections for some Christians facing persecution in their homelands, such as Afghans.
In Los Angeles, Torosian said the Iranian couple from his church called him for help when several men wearing US Border Patrol vests approached them near their home. As he filmed agents binding the hands of the husband, whose name CT is not publishing, the pastor told the agents, “He’s an asylum-seeker.”
“It doesn’t matter,” one agent says in the video.
“He came with CBP One,” Torosian replies, referring to the now-discontinued app that migrants used during the Biden administration to apply to lawfully enter the country.
“It’s no longer valid anymore. That’s why he’s being arrested,” another agent says.
Seconds later, the detained man’s wife collapses to the grass in an apparent panic attack, convulsing and hyperventilating. Torosian moves closer, attempting to comfort her. Agents tell him to keep away or face arrest himself.
The pastor asks if he can go with them or even follow them. “They need me,” he says. An agent says the pastor cannot go with them.
Torosian tells the agents that the couple was persecuted in Iran and fled because of their faith.
The agents don’t respond.
“They came here for freedom, not like this,” Torosian tells the agents. “I know you are doing your job, but shame on you. Shame on this government.”
Andy Olsen is senior features writer at Christianity Today.
