(ZENIT News / Rome, 17.02.2025).- Twenty-two days after the start of Donald Trump’s Administration, Pope Francis has positioned himself openly on the key aspect of the American President’s migratory policy. He did so on Tuesday, February 11, 2025, through a letter to the United States’ Catholic Episcopate.
The letter refers explicitly to the “delicate moments you are living as Shepherds of the People of God that walks in the United States of America,” and, subsequently, he pointed out what those “delicate moments” are: “The important crisis taking place in the United States on the occasion of the start of a program of massive deportations.”
The Holy Father’s text stems from a principle: “The Son of God, on making Himself man, also chose to live the drama of immigration.” He then underscores and ranks a universal principle of Catholic Doctrine: the most decisive value the human person has,” which surpasses and sustains every other consideration of a legal character that can be implemented to regulate life in society.”
Further on, the Pontiff expresses his positions, namely:
- “A correctly formed conscience cannot fail to make a critical judgment and express its disagreement with any measure that identifies, tacitly or implicitly, the illegal condition of some migrants with criminality.”
- “To be acknowledged is the right of a nation to defend itself and to keep its communities safe from those that have committed violent or serious crimes while they are in the country or before arriving.”
- “The act of deporting people, who in many cases have left their own land for reasons of extreme poverty, insecurity, exploitation, persecution or serious deterioration of the environment, hurts the dignity of many men and women, of entire families and places them in a state of special vulnerability and defenselessness.”
Those positions make evident what the Pope then calls: ”the dignified treatment that all people deserve, especially the poorest and marginalized,” asseveration that – according to the Pope – theoretically would not be against “promoting the maturation of a policy that regulates ordered and legal migration.”
The letter, in which Pope Francis acknowledges the “valuable effort” of the American Episcopate in the pastoral work with immigrants and refugees, ends with an exhortation, to Catholics in particular and to all people of good will in general, “not to yield to narratives that discriminate and make our migrant and refugee brothers suffer unnecessarily,” without alerting beforehand against ideological criteria, “which distort social life and impose the will of the strongest as criteria of truth.”
Although the Letter has been regarded as a novelty, in fact Letters of this type are not so. During Francis’s Pontificate he has made use of the epistolary genre to address matters of local interest, be it directly to all Christians or to them through the Bishops (1). In fact, it’s not the first time that the Pope sends a Letter to the American Episcopate, although the topic is different (2).
Why has a Papal Letter gained such relevance then? A quick response aims to assess whether it has been timely and prudent, but the answer requires greater depth.
According to the medium that is read, the Pope’s Letter will end up classified in categories such as “of the Left or the Right” or as “anti- Trump or pro the Democratic Party.” Not lacking, in fact, are references to the most recent migratory normative of Vatican City, of December 19, 2024, legislation that converts the micro State into one of the most restrictive in that matter in the whole of Europe. In good measure, the qualifiers used to read the Supreme Pontiff’s Letter enter in the current dynamic of the global polarization in so far as everything seems condemned to be placed or read in and from the extremes.
The questions seem legitimate about why the Pope pronounces himself openly about questions of the interior life of another country given that it has not been the tenor in other letters and given also that he himself has said in interviews that he prefers to leave such questions to the local Episcopates. However, it’s no less legitimate to consider that one of the great subjects that define this Pontificate is, precisely, that of migration. Suffice it to recall that Pope Francis’ first Apostolic Journey was in fact to the Island of Lampedusa, in the Mediterranean Sea, which he described as a “cemetery” and where, in regard to deceased migrants, he said:
“Where is your brother?” The voice of his blood cries out to me, says God. This isn’t a question directed to others, it’s a question directed to me, to you, to each one of us. Those brothers and sisters of ours were attempting to come out of difficult situations to find some serenity and peace; they sought a better place for themselves and their families, but they met with death. How many times those that seek such things do not find understanding, do not find welcome, do not find solidarity! And their voices reach God!
Questions on Donald Trump’s migratory policies seem legitimate, specifically about the deportations being experienced, but it is no less legitimate to consider that the implementation of those policies are not a surprise: they were a central part of his campaign and a reason why he won the elections. A recent survey (New York Times, January 18, 2025), shows that 87% of Americans are in favour of the deportation of illegal immigrants who have committed crimes. The percentage decreases to 55% of support for massive deportations in general and shows a surprising positioning of 54% of Hispanic support for the deportation of those that entered the United States illegally.
In regard to the elections, one cannot lose sight of the fact that American Catholics voted in the main for Donald Trump, according to exit polls conducted by both AP and The Washington Post (see here and here). This is important because the Pope’s Letter aims to reach and touch the life of a concrete group of people that, as demographic studies indicate, coincide more with the President of their country than with the Shepherd of the Church of which they are also a part. I stress that this isn’t my opinion, it’s what the data says. A personification of this example is the Catholic Vice-President of the United States, JD Vance.
He has been the one to take leadership in this matter to the degree of posing to the FOX channel a Christian concept (more specifically Augustinian) that for a long time has not been recalled or applied to the topic of migration: that of the “Ordo Amoris.” Asked by FOX, Vice-President Vance answered: “There is a Christian concept that you love your family and then your neighbor, and then the community, and then your fellow citizens, and after that, prioritize the rest of the world. A large part of the extreme Left has completely inverted that idea.”
It was to that very concept that Pope Francis wished to answer with his Letter when he wrote: “The true ordo amoris that it is necessary to promote, is the one we discover meditating constantly on the parable of the “Good Samaritan,” that is, meditating on the love that builds an open fraternity to all without exception.” That same evangelical passage was used days before in a letter to the Holy Father by a controversial American priest, to answer Vance on the social networks: Jesuit James Martin.
Just google “ordo amoris.” Aside from that, the idea that there isn’t a hierarchy of obligations violates basic common sense. Does Rory really think his moral duties to his own children are the same as his duties to a stranger who lives thousands of miles away? Does anyone? https://t.co/otvv5g1wFN
— JD Vance (@JDVance) January 30, 2025
There are those that have criticized Vance about the “Ordo Amoris” commenting with irony that for the Vice-President “Ordo Amoris” is equivalent to MAGA (see Mercator); however, the point is the confrontation between the baptized and pastors as Vance has suggested openly, that the American Episcopate’s opposition to Trump’s migratory policies and the withdrawal of the American Government’s funds to USAID are more concerned about the funds that Catholic Foundations cease to receive than about helping individuals. Perhaps it is in this context that the response of the President of the American Episcopate must be read to the Pope’s Letter: Archbishop Broglio asked the Holy Father to continue praying “so that we will be able, as a nation, to find the courage to build a more human system of immigration, which protects our communities and, at the same time, safeguards the dignity of all.”
Striking is the fact that those who came out to answer the Pope’s Letter are practicing Catholics. One of them is Tom Homan, Border Tsar, who after learning of the Letter’s existence, said in statements to the press:
“I have harsh words for the Pope: the Pope should fix the Catholic Church. I say it as a lifetime Catholic. I was baptized a Catholic, I made my First Communion as a Catholic, Confirmation as a Catholic. He should fix the Catholic Church and concentrate on his work and leave to us our border security. Does he want to attack us for ensuring our border? Does he not have a wall around the Vatican? So he has a wall around his people and around himself, but we can’t have a wall around the United States. «So I would like him to get involved with the Catholic Church and fix that and leave the border security to us.»
Of course the prudence and tone of such words can also be questioned, but the answer gives evidence of what we have been saying: the polarization it arouses and the reactions that the migratory topic awakens also in practicing Catholics.
The Trump Government is one of the Administrations with the largest presence of practicing Catholics in a Government; a third of the total. In addition to Vance and Homan, the new Secretary of Transport, Sean Duffy, is Catholic (and father of a numerous family); the new Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, is Catholic; the new Director of the CIA, John Ratcliffe, is Catholic, the Press Secretary, Katherine Leavitt, is Catholic, as is Health Secretary, Robert F. Kennedy, among others.
To be certainly acknowledged is that Pope Francis has an outstanding appreciation among American Catholics: according to a 2024 Pew Research Center survey, 75% of Catholics have a favourable view of the Pope, although in 2015 that positive appreciation reached 90%.
The questions seem legitimate regarding why the Pope pronounced himself on this topic, which has the American society so divided. However, it is no less legitimate to acknowledge that a Letter of a pastoral nature can have the intention (not always understood or sufficiently highlighted) to bring harmony and light where they are lacking. Another question the press points out is why there is such a Letter now. Archbishop José Gómez of Los Angeles has pointed out that the President who carried out the most deportations was Barack Obama.
Here are the numbers: up to February 14, Donald Trump deported 10,485 Mexicans, which means 437 Mexicans deported per day. These figures are lower than those in the previous Trump Administration, during which 525 Mexicans were deported per day. Both data on average daily deportations of Mexicans are in turn lower than daily deportations during Joe Biden’s Administration, which numbered 564 per day. How many daily deportations did the Obama government carry out? The average in his eight-year Administration was 975 Mexicans per day. The questions seem legitimate about why the Pope didn’t write a Letter about the same argument during past Administrations, but it is no less legitimate to admit that the current prominence of the immigration issue has led to positions that some qualify or associate with «hate speech» or dehumanization and that for this reason the Pope has seen it fit to intervene.
Part of this “hate speech” is the association of the “illegal immigrant” to the category of “criminal.” By definition, “a criminal is someone who commits a “crime.” However, in the collective imagination, “crime” and the qualifier derived from it are associated with a criminal action. That is especially grave. This is only the third meaning in the Dictionary of the Spanish Language, while a more general one is «misdeed or crime.» Not to be forgotten in this connection is that a sentence of culpability weighs on President Trump for having falsified business records to silence a relationship with former pornographic film actress Stormy Daniels, before the 2016 elections. Although the application of the sentence dictated by the Judge on January 10, 2025 did not entail prison or a fine, the guilty sentence remains firm and that makes Trump a “criminal” (in the meaning we stated before). That’s not my opinion, it’s what happened.
Taking up the topic again: usually countries establish what are crimes and what aren’t. And, at present, it is a crime in the United States to enter the country illegally. This is not my opinion either, it’s a fact. It seems legitimate that the Pope wants to contribute to reflect on why migration can constitute a crime, even though in the United States a good part of the population take this for granted.
In the last Super Bowl of February 9, 2025, two unimaginable scenes were seen: a stadium applauding President Trump when the camera focused on him and a stadium booing Taylor Swift, when the camera also focused on her. In the period before the 2024 presidential elections, Swift positioned herself publicly in favour of Kamala Harris. It must be said that the Pope has positioned himself in favour of the vulnerable individual, but in the present context of social polarization even noble gestures such as this one are not read from a good intention, but from conflict. It was thought that Swift would incline the balance towards Kamala Harris and the result was that one of the world’s most “powerful influencers” in the end was only popular.
In light of all that has been said, it seems legitimate to reflect on the real effect that the Pope’s Letter will have on the balance. One of the most important effects is not on the American political plane and social life but on global diplomacy. Today, Trump is an international political actor that, given the characteristics of his personality, could leave one of the most active actors off the board of diplomatic mediations: the Holy See. One must not lose sight of the fact that the Pope’s letter was addressed to the Bishops, but neither must one lose sight of the fact that Trump has a history of treating matters as personal things.
And then, has the papal missive been prudent and opportune? The Pope’s address to the U.S. Congress on September 24, 2015, seems to Live a personal key for the reading and discernment of the Pope’s 2025 Letter:
“Over the last centuries, millions of people have reached this land [the United States] pursuing the dream of being able to build their own future in freedom. We, who belong to this Continent, are not afraid of foreigners, because many of us a longtime ago were foreigners. I speak to you as the son of immigrants, as many of you are descendants of immigrants.
(. . . ) when the foreigner challenges us, we cannot commit the sins of the past. We must now choose the possibility of living in a more noble and just world, while forming the new generations, with an education that cannot ever turn its back on its “neighbours,” on all that surrounds us. To build a nation leads us to think of ourselves always in relation with others, coming out of the logic of the enemy to go to the logic of reciprocal subsidiarity, giving the best of ourselves. I trust we will do so.”
Notes:
- As a more remote example are the Letters to Christians of the Middle East (21.12.2014), to the President of the Argentine Episcopate (08.07.2016), to the Japanese Episcopate (14.09.2017), to the Chilean Episcopate (17.05.2018) to the Chilean people (31.08.2018) or to the German Catholics (29.06.2019. As more recent examples are the Letters to the Lebanese (24.12.2020), to the priests of the Diocese of Rome (31.05.2020 and 05.08.2023) to the Catholics of Scotland (09.11.2021), to the Syro-Malabar Church (27.09.2021) to the Ukrainian people (24.11.2022), to the Synod of the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church (30.06.2022), to the Catholics of Vietnam (08.09.2023), to the Catholic Church in Nicaragua (02.12.2024), to the Catholics of the Middle East (Holy Week 2024).
- On January 1, 2019, the Pope addressed a Letter to the Bishops of the United States on the “fight against the ‘culture of abuse’ and the way to address the crisis of credibility.”
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