Prophetic Intelligence Briefings
Vatican Redefines Illegal Immigrants as “Irregular” · June 30, 2010
Saying that the Catholic Church cannot accept the concept that some migrant workers are criminalized, the “second-in-command of the Pontifical Council for the Pastoral Care of Migrant and Itinerant Peoples, Archbishop Agostino Marchetto redefined them as “irregular” migrants instead.
He said he appreciated how the U.S. bishops have worked “against the criminalization of ‘irregular’ migrants…” He said the U.S. bishops have been working to protect “what we call ‘irregular’ migrants – we would not say ‘illegal’ migrants, no other word is worse for us,” from criminalization.
In the U.S., there has been a growing backlash against illegal immigrants from Latin America because of the loss of jobs, illegal activity like drug trafficking, and other reasons. Some states have enacted laws or invoked state militias to keep illegal immigrants out of those states, or remove them. Lack of action at the federal level is also adding to the backlash.
Now the Catholic bishops are doing what they can to build an argument that these people are not really “illegal” immigrants, they are just “irregular,” and should be granted basic human rights like all other citizens.
The reason for the concern of the Catholic Church is patently obvious. These illegal immigrants are changing the religious makeup of the U.S. Most of them are Roman Catholic. As they come into the country, and have babies, apply for residency and/or citizenship, this all dramatically adds Roman Catholics to the voting rolls.
“The pontifical council secretary told CNA, ‘I think for us, this criminalization of irregular migrants is something wrong… I think it is a fundamental battle … on the part of the Church, about the fact that we cannot accept the criminalization of irregular migrants,’ he said.”
Speaking of Catholics who oppose illegal immigration and want tougher measures to keep out illegal immigrants, the archbishop said, often “Catholic social doctrine is considered optional and this is against what is preached and (against) the insistence by John Paul II to try to help the people understand that it is a dimension of the moral teaching of the Church. It is a part of the ethical attitude of the good Christian, Catholic member of the Church.”
“The archbishop spoke of the ‘great effort’ that must be carried out to promote Church teaching on issues such as life, abortion, and other important questions. ‘But,’ he added, ‘we cannot forget also other aspects of Catholic teaching and we cannot accept these difficulties from a part of the Catholic population in accepting some (other) aspects of the Catholic social teaching of the Church …’”
Promoting illegal immigration is one of the ways that the Catholic Church is working to change America from a protestant to a Roman Catholic country.
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