This lecture by Sherry Thomas, JD, was recorded on June 7, 2025, at Seven Mile Road Church in Philadelphia, PA, at the conference “Our Story, Our Faith: South Asian American Christian Histories and Futures” (June 6–7, 2025). You can learn more about this conference here: https://ourstoriesourfaith.org/philly25/. View the plenary video here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1FpO9YtAICc.

Plenary description: This lecture will explore how South Asians, including South Asian Christians, came to “belong” in the United States, through the lens of landmark U.S. Supreme Court cases and legislation that both closed and opened doors to South Asian Christians. It will provide insight into why the South Asian Christian immigrant experience looked the way it did and how it continues to evolve as the country grapples with its relationship to race and religion.

View PBS’s video referenced at 24:02 of the video version (cut out of audio podcast due to copyright): https://youtu.be/0qggeLf4x-s?si=GGUf0z9rwBr3wvnv.

Check out Sherry Thomas’s oral history project with SAADA: https://www.saada.org/exhibit/philadelphia/malayali-story.

Sherry Thomas is Kerala born and Philadelphia raised. She completed her B.A. in International Relations from the University of Pennsylvania and her J.D. from Temple University. She is passionate about issues of social and economic justice and currently combines both in her career as a public interest lawyer. She focuses her work on tenants’ rights, defense and eviction prevention with the Legal Clinic for the Disabled (LCD), as its Director of Housing and Habitability and has also worked as a Legal Fellow and legal consultant for International Justice Mission (IJM), a global organization partnering with local justice systems to end violence against people living in poverty.

Sherry grew up in the Marthoma Church in a tight knit Malayali community in Philadelphia. She was always interested in the ways the church could be instrumental in bridging gaps between cultures and generations. Her experiences informed her work with the South Asian American Digital Archive (SAADA). Through SAADA, she preserved some stories of Malayali Christians living and working in Philadelphia, over several generations, which culminated in the publication of her project, “The Philadelphia Malayali Story: Decades in the Making.”

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