U.S. Catholic bishops blast immigration crackdowns
Assembly says asylum preserves ‘right to life’
The nation’s Roman Catholic bishops on Wednesday pounded away against the hard-line immigration policy of the Trump administration.
They decried policies ranging from removing the chance of asylum for many people fleeing violence to separating asylum-seeking families, leading to “agonizing scenes at the border of anguished parents and terrified children.”
One bishop, Edward Weisenburger of Tucson, Ariz., even proposed “canonical penalties” for Catholics who are involved in what the bishops consider immoral immigration enforcement. While he didn’t get into specifics, his idea appeared to echo efforts by some bishops to deny communion for politicians who support abortion rights.
The bishops have long been advocates for a humane and generous immigration policy, putting them at odds with the administration of President Donald Trump and many anti-immigrant hardliners among the Republican majority in Congress.
In recent days, Attorney General Jeff Sessions has said the criteria for obtaining asylum in the U.S. has become too broad. He also has said that asylum seekers who do not want to be separated from their children should not approach the border.
On Wednesday, the bishops’ frustration boiled over in comments at their spring assembly in Fort Lauderdale, Fla.
Their litany of lament included:
• Mr. Sessions’ directive to immigration courts that they not consider gang-related or domestic violence as cause for asylum.
• U.S. enforcement officers separating children from parents seeking asylum at the border.
• The administration’s ending of Temporary Protected Status for various categories of the foreign-born who were displaced by natural disasters and who have lived here for years.
• Continued blockage in Congress of any effort to give legal status to so-called Dreamers, those brought illegally to this country as young children by their families who had received some legal breathing space under the Obama administration’s DACA policy, or Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals.
“At its core, asylum is an instrument to preserve the right to life,” Cardinal Daniel DiNardo said at the opening of the spring meeting of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, of which he is president.
“The attorney general’s recent decision elicits deep concern because it potentially strips asylum from many women who lack adequate protection,” said Cardinal DiNardo, archbishop of Galveston-Houston and formerly a Pittsburgh priest.
In follow-up comments, Cardinal DiNardo said that while the United States has the obligation to enforce its immigration laws, it is essential to defend “the weak and the vulnerable.”
He added: “The reason why this can happen … is that those in charge, in authority, know they can get away with it. That’s the horrible thing about this.”
Cardinal Joseph Tobin of Newark, N.J., called for a delegation of bishops to inspect the situation at the U.S.-Mexico border “as a sign of our pastoral concern and our protest against this hardening of the American heart.”
The bishops, whose church membership is increasingly Hispanic, noted that many immigrants lacking legal status are their own parishioners.
Archbishop Jose Gomez of Los Angeles said family separation is no deterrent to those desperately fleeing violent homelands in Latin America. Instead, he said, it leads to “agonizing scenes at the border of anguished parents and terrified children.”
One bishop suggested picketing federal courthouses in the way they have protested outside abortion clinics, and another bishop said the issue is inseparable from abortion because “the undocumented are making the most extreme sacrifices on behalf of the unborn” and include many pregnant women and mothers of young children.