5/12/08 pt. 5: Bishops’ statements on Immigration Reform

(Brian Ray/The Gazette) Rev. Richard Gaul sits solemnly with his head down as the names of all 389 undocumented workers that were arrested in the immigration raid at the Agriprocessors plant are read during a prayer service to mark the one year anniversary of the raid Tuesday in Postville.

Following are statements by United States Catholic Bishops calling for immigration reform:

The message from the prophet Isaiah is clear. The message is strong.
The Spirit of God has been given to us. We have been anointed. We have been selected for a special work.
We are told to bring good news to the poor…to bind up hearts that are broken and to proclaim a year of favor from our God.
This, my friends, is our time. It is our moment. It is our year of favor. Let us proclaim the year 2009 as the year for comprehensive immigration reform. We must work so that there would no longer be any immigration raids—no more immigration raids to traumatize a people, to separate families, to destroy businesses, to shatter towns and to scar hearts forever.
(Snip)
As proclaimers of God’s word, it is our duty to sound a call for justice. It is our privilege to welcome the stranger. It is our challenge to bring good news to the poor. This, my friends, is our time! This is our moment! This is our year of favor!

Archbishop Jerome Hanus, Dubuque, May 12, 2009, St. Bridget

The so called “illegals” are so not because they wish to defy the law; but because the law does not provide them with any channels to regularize their status in our country-which needs their labor: they are not breaking the law, the law is breaking them.

Bishop Thomas Wenski, Orlando

In our view, immigration reform should contain a broad-based legalization program which provides a path to citizenship; a future worker program with protections for both immigrant and domestic workers; family-based immigration reform that reduces backlogs without harming the current preference categories; restoration of due-process protections, including revision of the three- and ten-year bars and restoration of judicial discretion in deportation hearings; integration and implementation provisions; and measures that address the root causes of unlawful migration by encouraging economic development in sending countries.

Bishop John Wester, Chairman U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Committee on Migration at the Senate Committee on the Judiciary Subcommittee on Immigration, Refugees, and Border Security

As religious leaders, my brother Catholic bishops and I understand and support the right and responsibility of the government to enforce the law. We strongly believe, however, that worksite enforcement raids do not solve the challenge of illegal immigration. Instead, they lead to the separation of U.S. families and the destruction of immigrant communities. The result of the Postville raid was family separation, immense suffering, denial of due process rights and community division.

Our religious and social response to such harm to our God-given human dignity is based on Scriptures, which call believers to welcome the newcomers among us, to treat the alien with respect and charity, and to provide pastoral and humanitarian assistance to individuals and their families.

Bishop John Wester, Chairman U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Committee on Migration, statement on Behalf of the USCCB on the anniversary of the May 12 Work Enforcement Raid in Postville

Migration in the Light of Catholic Social Teaching
28. Catholic teaching has a long and rich tradition in defending the right to migrate. Based on the life and teachings of Jesus, the Church’s teaching has provided the basis for the development of basic principles regarding the right to migrate for those attempting to exercise their God-given human rights. Catholic teaching also states that the root causes of migration–poverty, injustice, religious intolerance, armed conflicts–must be addressed so that migrants can remain in their homeland and support their families.

29. In modern times, this teaching has developed extensively in response to the worldwide phenomenon of migration. Pope Pius XII reaffirms the Church’s commitment to caring for pilgrims, aliens, exiles, and migrants of every kind in his apostolic constitution Exsul Familia, affirming that all peoples have the right to conditions worthy of human life and, if these conditions are not present, the right to migrate. “Then–according to the teachings of [the encyclical] Rerum Novarum–the right of the family to a [life worthy of human dignity]⁶ is recognized. When this happens, migration attains its natural scope as experience often shows.”⁷

30. While recognizing the right of the sovereign state to control its borders, Exsul Familia also establishes that this right is not absolute, stating that the needs of immigrants must be measured against the needs of the receiving countries:

Since land everywhere offers the possibility of supporting a large number of people, the sovereignty of the State, although it must be respected, cannot be exaggerated to the point that access to this land is, for inadequate or unjustified reasons, denied to needy and decent people from other nations, provided of course, that the public wealth, considered very carefully, does not forbid this.

Excerpt from the USCCB pastoral letter on Migration entitled, “Strangers No Longer, Together on a journey of Hope”.