By John Lavenburg

PROSPECT HEIGHTS — Speaking to the faithful ahead of National Migration Week, Archbishop Jośe Gomez of Los Angeles encouraged prayer for a society of “solidarity and compassion” that better serves the “poor and least among us.”

“My brothers and sisters, once again, we are called to help our neighbors and leaders to feel compassion for the common humanity and destiny that we share with one another, including our immigrant brothers and sisters,” Archbishop Gomez said. “So let us keep praying for our nation and working hard for immigration reform, and let us remember to keep our lives centered on Jesus.”

Archbishop Gomez, the president of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, made the comments during his homily at an afternoon Mass on Sept. 18 to commemorate the start of the U.S. Catholic Church’s National Migration Week, Sept. 19-25.

Before the Mass, held at the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels in Los Angeles, 50 ministry leaders were honored for their work and support of immigrants and their families. Civic and diplomatic leaders, including the Consuls of Mexico and Guatemala, were present.

Archbishop Gomez celebrated the Mass and was joined by clergy from the Dioceses of San Bernardino, Orange, and San Diego. Relics of St. Junipero Serra, St. Frances Xavier Cabrini, and St. Toribio Romo — all saints of great significance to the immigrant community — were placed by the altar during the Mass.

During the homily, Archbishop Gomez lamented that the nation’s immigration system hadn’t been addressed for decades, saying that “we need to pray harder for our government officials and lawmakers” while never losing hope that immigration reform can be realized.

This year’s National Migration Week comes amid an ongoing immigration crisis in the U.S. There were more than 2.2 million migrant encounters nationwide between October 2021 and July 2022, and specifically more than 1.9 million migrant encounters at the southern border during the same span, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection data. Both figures well exceed the respective totals for Fiscal Year 2021 by more than 200,000.

U.S. Bishops and Catholic immigration leaders this year have consistently called for long-needed comprehensive immigration reform by Congress, and the elimination of deterrent policies at the border, mainly Title 42, that limit migrants’ legal rights to seek asylum.

They’ve also called for a pathway to citizenship for the approximate 611,000 Dreamers — undocumented immigrants who arrived in the U.S. as children — and for the Biden administration to re-designate Venezuela and Syria for Temporary Protected Status, citing the ongoing humanitarian crises that exist in each country.

Another call has been for the passage of federal legislation that would provide newly arrived Afghans an opportunity to become lawful permanent residents, which would impact more than 80,000 Afghan refugees who have resettled in the U.S. since last August when the Taliban took control of Afghanistan.

In a Sept. 16 statement ahead of National Migration Week, Auxiliary Bishop Mario Dorsonville of Washington, the USCCB’s migration committee chair, highlighted migrants in the U.S., including Dreamers, Afghans, Ukrainians fleeing the war, TPS recipients, and undocumented agriculture workers, and their “important role” in “building the future” of the United States.

“This week provides a special opportunity for encounter, accompaniment, and prayer, as well as a chance for Catholics and others of goodwill to join together in support of those who depend on our collective voice,” Bishop Doronsville said, adding that he hopes this week provides “a renewed sense of what it means to live as brothers and sisters, traveling together on the same journey.”

The statement follows the theme for this year’s National Migration Week, “Building the Future with Migrants and Refugees.” The theme mirrors that of the Vatican’s World Day of Migrants and Refugees on Sunday, Sept. 25.

In recent months, the immigration conversation in the U.S. has been dominated by the actions of Republican Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, busing migrants to Democratic-led cities — Washington, D.C., New York City, Chicago — as a rebuke to President Joe Biden’s border policies. The move has led to a constant war of words between the cities’ mayors and Abbott as the cities struggle to respond to the migrants’ needs.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis initiated his own migrant-moving campaign last week, sending about 50 migrants on two flights to Martha’s Vineyard, an island off Massachusetts. Massachusetts Gov. Charlie Baker announced days later that the migrants were moved to a temporary shelter on the mainland that could better accommodate their needs.

Cardinal Séan O’Malley of Boston responded to DeSantis’s action on Sept. 16, focusing on the need to fix a broken immigration system that led to the present situation.

“From the Dreamers who still seek legal stability in their lives to those fleeing war in Ukraine, poverty in Latin America and Africa, or crises in the Middle East, the call of our common humanity will be with us for years to come,” he said. “I pray we will be equal to the challenge.”

Cardinal Blase Cupich of Chicago, where Abbott began busing migrants on Aug. 31, focused his National Migration Week message on the importance of welcoming the stranger.

“As Christians, we are called to welcome the stranger, the refugee, the marginalized and displaced persons, because they are children of God,” Cardinal Cupich said in a Sept. 15 statement. “Each migrant has a name, a face, and a story, and, as they arrive in our archdiocese, let us continue to welcome them with peace and fraternity.”

 

By Junno Arocho Esteves

VATICAN CITY (CNS) — Standing near a mass grave site in eastern Ukraine and seeing the delicate and solemn removal of bodies, Polish Cardinal Konrad Krajewski, papal almoner, said he could only pray.

“I knew I would find so many dead, but I met men who showed the beauty that is sometimes hidden in our hearts,” Cardinal Krajewski said after visiting the mass grave in the northeastern city of Izium.

“They showed a human beauty in a place where there could have only been revenge. Instead, there wasn’t,” he told Vatican News in an interview published Sept. 19.

Russian forces fled the area after Ukraine launched a counteroffensive to regain occupied territory. In a forest near Izium, soldiers found a mass grave site with the remains of an estimated 500 people.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, in a video message, said investigators saw evidence that some of the victims had been tortured.

Similar mass grave sites were found earlier this year in other areas formerly occupied by Russian forces.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov denied Russia’s involvement in the atrocities, and repeated accusations that mass grave sites were staged by Ukraine, the Reuters news agency reported.

Cardinal Krajewski, who was accompanied by Ukrainian Bishop Pavlo Honcharuk of Kharkiv-Zaporizhia, said the careful removal of the bodies in Izium seemed like a solemn liturgy.

“There was one thing that touched me so much,” he told Vatican News Service. “These young Ukrainians were pulling out the bodies so gently, so quietly, in total silence. It looked like a ‘celebration’; nobody was talking but there were so many policemen and soldiers there — at least 200 people. All in silence, with an incredible appreciation for the mystery of death. Truly there was so much to learn from these people.”

Noting that the workers removed the bodies as if they were doing it “for their own families, for their parents, children, siblings,” Cardinal Krajewski said that he and Bishop Honcharuk could only watch and pray.

“The bishop and I were walking around among them. I was reciting the Divine Mercy Chaplet the whole time; we were there for at least three hours. I couldn’t do anything else,” he said.

“This is what has stayed with me now that I’m back in Kharkiv. I am in the chapel and think about these young people,” he said.

In an interview with Vatican News published Sept. 17, Cardinal Krajewski said he and several others came under gunfire while delivering humanitarian aid to suffering Ukrainians on Pope Francis’ behalf.

The Polish cardinal was delivering goods in the southeastern Ukrainian city of Zaporizhzhia with a Catholic bishop, a Protestant bishop and a Ukrainian soldier when the attack occurred.

“For the first time in my life, I didn’t know where to run because it’s not enough to run. You have to know where to go,” the cardinal said.

The cardinal and those with him managed to escape the attack and continued delivering goods loaded in a minibus.

The Dicastery for the Service of Charity announced Sept. 9 that Cardinal Krajewski would embark on his fourth trip to Ukraine and visit Odesa, Zhytomyr, Kharkiv and other locations in eastern Ukraine.

The purpose of his visit, the dicastery said, was to provide support to “various communities of faithful, priests and religious, and their bishops, who for more than 200 days continue to remain in the places of their ministry despite the dangers of war.”

“It is a silent and evangelical trip to be with the people who are suffering, praying and comforting each of them, showing with his presence that they are not alone in this situation that is only bringing destruction and death,” the statement said.

Speaking by telephone with Vatican News, Cardinal Krajewski noted that his visit to Ukraine coincided with the ninth anniversary of his episcopal ordination and his appointment as papal almoner.

The cardinal said he spent the day loading a minibus with provisions and rosaries blessed by the pope and delivering them to people in areas where “no one besides soldiers enter anymore.”

Witnessing the devastation of war in the country on the day of his anniversary, Cardinal Krajewski told Vatican News that it was a “day without mercy” in which “there are no tears nor words.”

“We can only pray and repeat: ‘Jesus, I trust in you,’” the cardinal said.