Pope Francis recently claimed that immigration laws should be loosened and borders should be demilitarized amid the mass migration that has impacted Europe in recent years. Promoting the idea of allowing immigrants to cross international borders at will, the Pope called it a “grave sin” to turn away migrants.
“Rather than more restrictive laws and the militarization of borders, what is needed is an expansion of secure and regular means of access,” the Pope said. He called for “a global governance of migrations based on justice, fraternity, and solidarity.”
The pontiff claimed that it is sinful to “systematically turn away” migrants from borders. “It must be said clearly: there are those who work systematically and by any means to turn away migrants – to turn away migrants. And this, when done with conscience and responsibility, is a grave sin,” he said.
Francis further claimed that God “shares the drama of migrants, God is with them, with migrants, he suffers with them, with migrants, he weeps and hopes with them, with migrants.” He maintained that God is with migrants, “not with those who turn them away.”
The Pope also praised people and organizations that assist in helping migrants. “These courageous men and women are a sign of a humanity that does not allow itself to be infected by the bad culture of indifference and waste,” he said; “what kills migrants is our indifference and that attitude of discarding.” He added, “And I ask you: do you pray for migrants, for these who come to our lands to save their lives? And ‘you’ want to chase them away.”
However, not everyone in the Catholic Church shares the same sentiment as Pope Francis, particularly in Africa where many of the migrants come from. Nigerian Cardinal John Onaiyekan, the archbishop of Abuja, Nigeria, has said that the mass migration out of his country is a sign of failure in political leadership. “Authorities should make Nigeria home. Same should be applicable to other African countries,” he stated. “To tell you bluntly I’m ashamed, I’m ashamed,” he added. “I’m moving through the streets of Rome, Milan, Naples and I see my daughters on the street on sale,” the cardinal continued, calling out the consequences of the migration Europe.
“I’m ashamed and I stop and even greet some of them — you can’t even engage them in conversation because they were brought out of the village illiterates. All they learn and all they know on the streets of Italy is what they need for this business — I’m ashamed,” he continued.
Guinean Cardinal Robert Sarah claimed that it is wrong to “use the word of God to promote migration.” Sarah argued that it is a “false interpretation” of Scripture to do so, maintaining that it is better “to help people flourish in their culture than to encourage them to come to Europe.”
Sarah also pointed out the poor outcomes that result from mass European migration. “The crisis of the Church is above all a crisis of the faith,” he said. “Some want the Church to be a human and horizontal society; they want it to speak the language of the media. They want to make it popular.”
Featured image credit: Casa Rosada (Argentina Presidency of the Nation), CC BY-SA 2.0 , via Wikimedia Commons, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Pope_Francis_in_March_2013.jpg