The Sunday before the Tennessee legislature voted to pass a sweeping immigration law, state Sen. Brent Taylor, R-Memphis, walked out of his home church before the service began.

During the pre-service announcements at Trinity Baptist Church, Pastor Matt Crawford criticized the end of sanctuary policies for churches, which allows Immigration and Customs Enforcement to make arrests inside places of worship.

“I hope that we can believe both in the rule of law and feel that we don’t want worship services disrupted by that. I hope that me saying that doesn’t anger you,” Crawford said. “Hopefully, we can talk about things with unity and nuance and even differences of opinion because it’s on the hearts of some of our people.”

Taylor walked out, he said, because he “didn’t show up to church tha

See Full Page