At the end of January, in the face of the Trump administration’s ongoing aggressive deportation campaign, Philadelphia Archbishop Nelson J. Pérez released a brief statement in English and Spanish, “Regarding the Need for Balanced, Compassionate, and Comprehensive Immigration Reform.” I happened to attend a bilingual mass in the first week of February and heard the statement as read by my pastor. Pérez’s statement strikes me as emblematic of a common response we see from Catholic leadership in the United States when it comes to immigration and politically divisive issues more broadly. To my mind, it represents a missed opportunity for genuine leadership.
The statement begins by marking the divisiveness surrounding immigration, calling for prayerful discernment, appealing to Matthew 25:40, and reminding us that promoting human dignity is the essence of the Church’s moral and social teaching. So far, so good. This is, rightfully, the epitome of Church teaching as it pertains to the Trump administration’s plainly inhumane response to what it—often inaccurately—labels “illegal immigration.”
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