According to the Salvation Army, maintaining a shared view of human dignity is one of the greatest challenges and responsibilities of our time, which is why the Tidö government’s migration policy has made it impossible for them to remain silent any longer.

In an op-ed article, Robert Tuftström, deputy leader of the Salvation Army, highlights several individual cases where migrants are said to have suffered due to Sweden’s tightened migration policy.

One example mentioned is the “mother of four with a PTSD diagnosis and fibromyalgia” who wakes up at night from “nightmares of her home country.” In order to become a Swedish citizen, she must learn Swedish—a requirement they argue is far too tough as she has not even learned to read or write in her native language.

We are seeing a societal development where immigrants are met with tough demands and where people are judged solely by what they can produce and achieve. In the Salvation Army, we believe that every person’s value comes from our likeness to the Divine, not from our productivity or achievements.

As Tuftström identifies maintaining a shared view of human dignity as one of the greatest challenges and tasks of our time, they urge “everyone with the power to influence to safeguard human dignity in both words and actions.”

They also believe that people must never be “reduced to numbers or volumes moved here and there,” but that “every individual, their situation, and unique value must be recognized—regardless of background.” According to Tuftström and the Salvation Army, “this is how we build a society that holds together and can flourish in the future.”

READ ALSO: Church of Sweden in protest against the Tidö Government: “Children do not belong in prison”