Reverend Salguero has a heart for kids, especially those who are orphaned by immigration laws.

At least 5,100 children of undocumented parents are currently in foster care because their mothers and fathers are either detained in detention centers or deported, according to the Applied Research Center. If nothing changes, 15,000 more children will face a similar fate in the next five years.

As law enforcement crackdowns continue--more than 100,000 immigrant parents have been deported over the past 10 years--children remain a vulnerable, unprotected group.

This reality shatters Rev. Salguero, who ministers to many undocumented individuals at The Lamb’s Church in New York City. “I am not a politician,” he says. “I am a pastor. And as an Evangelical Christian, I pray every day that we find a law that doesn’t separate families. I pray that we’re able to fix this broken system in a way that’s consistent with the love of God.

“We should not be a country that separates families,” continues Rev. Salguero, president of the National Latino Evangelical Coalition, an organization that seeks to promote justice for the Hispanic population.

Rev. Salguero shares the fears of the people he shepherds. “Many say to me, ‘I’m afraid I’m going to be deported and there won’t be anybody to pick up my kid from school. What will my child do?’

Stories in the media chronicle this very thing. Some children--many of whom are U.S. citizens--come home from school, only to find an empty house. There may be a relative to care for them—or not. If there’s no one to help them, they go into foster care.

Studies show these children experience feelings of abandonment, and demonstrate symptoms of emotional trauma, psychological distress and mental health problems.

Rev. Salguero has seen the effect on deported parents too. While in Honduras on a trip to rebuild a church, he encountered a woman he calls Maria. She came to the church and shared her story with him.

Maria had been deported two years ago and left behind two children, one 8 and the other 12. A relative is caring for them, but she also is under the fear of deportation, says Rev. Salguero. If that happens, the children will go into foster care.

“As she told us her story, Maria wept uncontrollably,” Rev. Salguero shares. “She hadn’t seen her children in two years. They were 6 and 10 when she was ripped from them. How can any mother bear that? We need to take a compassionate view on this.”

For that compassion, Rev. Salguero turns to the God of the Bible who mandates welcoming strangers. He also turns to Jesus, who loved children and urged them to come to him.

Rev. Salguero knows people are sharply divided about immigration in this country. But children shouldn’t be made to suffer for harsh laws that destroy families.

“I don’t want to see any more kids in foster care,” says Rev. Salguero. “I don’t want to see any more mothers or fathers in detention centers for weeks or months at a time.

“We have to do better than this,” he concludes. “We just have to.”