Venezuelan family members talk April 2, 2019, after receiving food and other emergency support from the Consolata Missionary Sisters in Boa Vista, Brazil. Two Catholic-backed organizations opened a center in Brazil’s capital to host Venezuelan migrants relocating from the refugee centers in the Amazon region. The refugees are expected to begin arriving at the center in March 2021. (CNS Photo/Paul Jeffrey)
OFFICE FOR SOCIAL MINISTRY
“As a nation of immigrants, we have a moral obligation to help our brothers and sisters around the world who are in need.” (United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, May 4, 2021)
While America still struggles with COVID-19 and other social challenges, U.S. Catholics have been coming together to help our migrant brothers and sisters in need. At the beginning of May, President Biden announced a new administration policy that would increase the refugee admissions cap from 15,000 to 62,500 for the current fiscal year. Shortly after the announcement, Bishop Mario Dorsonville, chairman of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Committee on Migration released a statement applauding the increase as a first step in reaching a larger goal:
“The updated refugee admissions cap is a step in the right direction to help those who need it most. We view this number as a stepping stone toward the administration’s stated goal of 125,000 admissions, a figure more consistent with our values and capabilities as a nation. For decades, the United States has been a leader in refugee resettlement.
“We are in the midst of the greatest forced displacement crisis of our lifetime and know that there are more than 26 million refugees worldwide and more than 47 million people who are internally displaced. It is imperative that we act now to ensure the safety of these individuals and their families.
“The Catholic Church teaches that every person is created in God’s image and must be valued, protected and respected for the inherent dignity that he or she possesses. It is more important now than ever that our country continue to lead as we address this humanitarian emergency.”
Catholics are also responding to the surge of migrant asylum seekers on the U.S. mainland’s southern border, many of whom traveled on their own or in small groups, fleeing gang and government violence in Central America, or escaping collapsing economies and communities left uninhabitable by two severe hurricanes in 2020.
Thousands have spent months, even years, waiting across the border in Mexico, stranded in the grueling conditions of makeshift camps. This pent-up need now threatens to overwhelm the capacity of Catholic Charities USA (CCUSA) assistance sites along the border, which have been asked to coordinate services to thousands of unaccompanied minors and families seeking asylum.
The U.S. Catholic Leadership Conference of Women Religious has appealed to its members to volunteer with CCUSA at the border to assist asylum seekers who need rest and a chance to clean up, get something to eat and find new clothes. At least 200 nuns have already risen to the challenge to accompany these migrants in their transition to the homes of their sponsors in the United States.
The nuns will also be working with thousands of teenage boys who are being temporarily housed in public coliseums and shelters. Many emotional family reunions now are taking place nearly every day at temporary migrant shelter sites. One sister volunteer reported a heart-tugging moment when twin teens, who had arrived at the border as unaccompanied minors, reunited with their mom who had not seen them for several years.
In his recent message for the 107th World Day for Migrants and Refugees, Pope Francis explained this year’s theme “Toward an ever wider we” as “an invitation for all of us to commit ourselves to restoring our human family.” As part of the world day’s campaign, the Vatican released a video that includes U.S. Bishop Mark Seitz talking story about serving in his diocese of El Paso, Texas, on the border with Mexico:
“I’ve found the most rewarding opportunities of my life serving here at the border. I’ve learned that borders can be vibrant places of encounter and welcome. Encounters that enrich us. I’ve learned that we are all interconnected as one human family. We stand or fall together. Today, people of faith need to be bridge builders. The Holy Spirit breaks down everything that separates us — walls of poverty, indifference and exclusion. Here at the border, and in every place of encounter with those on the margins, God is calling us to be ‘bridge people.’ God is weaving a beautiful new future.”
In Hawaii, the Diocese of Honolulu’s Office for Social Ministry is working with Catholic Charities Hawaii and parishes on the Big Island to possibly provide space for community partners, such as The Legal Clinic and the University of Hawaii Refugee and Immigration Legal Clinic, to offer much needed legal help to migrants and refugees.
For more information on ways to respond to the Gospel call to accompany the vulnerable on the margins and journey with our migrant brothers and sisters together toward an ever wider “we,” please visit the websites: migrants-refugees.va and officeforsocialministry.org.
Mahalo,
your friends at the Office for Social Ministry
