•Churches: Worshippers in hiding

Attendance at Blanco's Santa Maria Virgen, called the fastest-growing church in the Episcopal Diocese of Oklahoma, has dwindled sharply — a 50 percent decrease that Blanco blames on the Oklahoma immigration reform law that goes into effect Thursday. "Four months ago, this church was very full, but now the people are nervous. They don't like going out,” Blanco, a native of Guatemala, said in Spanish through an interpreter.

"I believe that the law should be there to protect and bring unity. Instead of getting us together, it's driving us apart.”

Blanco is not alone:

•More than 1,000 individually signed "Pledge of Resistance” letters from Sacred Heart Catholic Church members. The letters are expected to be presented to Gov. Brad Henry's office today. The pledge was drafted by a Quaker and Church of the Nazarene social justice leader as a faith response to HB 1804 and adopted by the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Oklahoma. The letters from Sacred Heart support a copy of the pledge initially presented to the governor last week.

•An Interfaith Vigil of Prayer and Solidarity for Undocumented Persons has been planned for Thursday.

•A Catholic priest says the law is unjust and sinful while an Episcopal clergyman likened the law to the vigilante justice of the Ku Klux Klan.

But state Rep. Randy Terrill, R-Moore, stands by HB 1804, the reform law he authored that has drawn the clergy's ire.

"I find it troubling that they would conveniently overlook the fact that providing services for undocumented persons with taxpayer funds is severely straining our social safety net for our own citizens. This is immoral,” he said.

The debate over the morality of the immigration reform law is picking up steam as its implementation date looms.

Religious leaders say immigrants have a right to migrate to improve their quality of life, but Terrill said it is not that simple.