As stragglers hurriedly removed their coats and settled into the already packed pews in downtown Chicago on Sunday, the Rev. John Cusick walked to the middle of the sanctuary and offered a sort of apology for what he was about to say, explaining that “in the United States right now, you basically can’t say of much of anything without creating enemies.”
The din inside Old St. Patrick’s stopped and the congregation quieted.
“I’m very much in pain,” the priest said. Alluding to a series of executive orders from President Donald J. Trump that are designed to crackdown on undocumented immigrants and ban refugees from entering the country, he continued, “I had to say to myself, where is Christ in this?”
He said that over his 47 years as a priest it has sometimes occurred to him that just because something is legal does not mean it is moral. He offered up the death penalty and abortion as examples.
Then Father Cusick asked, “What we have seen since Friday afternoon, is it right?”
Sensing that some in the congregation might be uneasy about such a political hot topic being discussed in church, he said the issue went beyond politics.
“I don’t care about your politics. I’m apolitical,” he continued. “But I’m a follower of Christ and I preach Christ. My former pastor, may he rest in peace, said to me one day, ‘John, find where the poor, the broken and the discriminated are, and you will find where Christ is.’”
“Need I say anymore?” he asked.
He said the news over the past week pained him so much that he had “to do something this time,” which for him meant reaching out to an immigration activist and asking how he could help. He challenged those present to do something as well.
“And I ask all of you, whichever lever you pulled or line you filled in on Nov. 8, I don’t care. But I care when good people do nothing, and I do not want to be in that group,” he said.
“So I ask all of us, before your head hits the pillow tonight, answer one question: What will I do for the people living in fear who cannot come home right now to America where they live, who feel threatened?” he asked.
Applauding enthusiastically, the congregation rose to their feet to sing the opening hymn as Mass began.
The scene inside Old St. Pat’s was just one of many ways Catholics responded to President Trump’s first week. It began with some high-profile Catholics praising the president but ended with a slew of statements from bishops, Catholic universities and charities expressing shock at how quickly the administration moved in disrupting the lives of migrants and refugees.
On Jan. 23, the president signed an executive order reinstating the so-called Mexico City Policy, which prohibits U.S. tax dollars from paying for or promoting abortion overseas. Cardinal Timothy Dolan, archbishop of New York and head of the bishops’ pro-life committee, praised the executive order, calling it “welcome step toward restoring and enforcing important federal policies that respect the most fundamental human right—the right to life.”
A few days later, on Jan. 27, Vice President Mike Pence addressed the March for Life, a massive anti-abortion march held each January in Washington. His appearance, the first ever at the march for a vice president, drew praise from Boston’s Cardinal Sean O’Malley, an advisor to Pope Francis.
“I was very edified by the stance of the Vice President, which was obviously one of a person who is very deeply pro-life,” the cardinal wrote on his blog. “It was not an angry rant but a call for compassion and for understanding, a genuine call for the defense of all human life.”
Though the cardinals praised the Trump administration on abortion, they expressed some concern with his other actions affecting immigration, with hints of a refugee ban already circulating.
On Friday, news broke that the Mr. Trump had signed the executive order that bans Syrian refugees from entering the United States indefinitely, enacts a 120-day block on all refugees seeking entry into the country and reduces by half the total number of refugees the United States plans to resettle in 2017.
That development led the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops to publish its third statement of the week condemning a Trump executive order: The first condemned an executive order speeding up the proposal to build a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border; the second condemned Mr. Trump’s plan to pull federal funds from sanctuary cities; and the one released last Friday condemned the refugee ban.
That afternoon, the bishops’ migration and refugee office promoted an online campaign to get Catholics to contact their legislators about protecting the rights of migrants. By Monday, more than 16,000 had filled out an online form to contact members of Congress.
As demonstrators flocked to U.S. airports to protest the order, the bishops’ office of refugee and migration services coordinated with Catholic organizations to schedule volunteer lawyers headed to airports to offer assistance to families of those being affected by the order.
As the weekend progressed, several bishops added their voices to the mix.
On Sunday, Cardinal Blase Cupich of Chicago called the developments “a dark moment in U.S. history,” and Bishop Robert McElroy of San Diego said the president’s “executive order is the introduction into law of campaign sloganeering rooted in xenophobia and religious prejudice.”
That afternoon, about 500 Catholics gathered for Mass in front of the White House, praying for those affected by the president’s executive orders.
The archbishop of Washington, Cardinal Donald Wuerl, urged caution, writing on his blog that “the legal situation is still fluid and news reports are sometimes confusing” while acknowledging that “in the meantime, real people and real humanitarian concerns are being affected.”
The bishop of Portland, Maine, Robert Deeley, said in a statement that the order had “left many refugee families in Maine, as well as their family members still seeking entry into the United States, filled with anxiety and fear about what will happen to them.”
Many Catholic colleges and universities also weighed in, citing concerns about how the order would affect international students.
The president of the University of Notre Dame was among the first among high-profile Catholic colleges, saying in a statement on Sunday morning that the executive order harmed higher education in the United States.The Rev. John Jenkins called the order “sweeping, indiscriminate and abrupt.”
“If it stands,” he continued, “it will over time diminish the scope and strength of the educational and research efforts of American universities, which have been the source not only of intellectual discovery but of economic innovation for the United States and international understanding for our world.”
Leaders at Boston College also challenged the order, writing in a statement, that it was “contrary to American understandings of this nation’s role as a refuge and its place as a society that does not discriminate on the basis of religion or national origin.”
Calling the executive order “significant and concerning,” Georgetown’s President John DeGioia said in a statement that the Jesuit university “values the contributions of our international students, staff and faculty, and we are deeply committed to interreligious dialogue and providing a context in which members of all faith backgrounds are welcomed and encouraged to practice their faith.”
Across town, the Catholic University of America was measured in its response, urging calm and not criticizing the order itself.
“At this time we cannot know with certainty how recent executive orders will affect people seeking education, refuge and citizenship in our country,” President John Garvey said in a statement, urging international students to contact administration with any concerns.
By Monday afternoon, the heads of the bishops conference as well as the nation’s largest organization representing Catholic sisters had also weighed in.
The Leadership Conference of Women Religious accused the president of having “misplaced priorities” and said his executive orders “do nothing to make anyone more secure and may well have the opposite effect.”
“Women religious have been blessed to be able to accompany and serve immigrant and refugee communities across this country for a very long time,” the statement continued. “Halting or undermining the U.S. refugee resettlement program leaves vulnerable refugees, including women and children fleeing violence, in extreme danger and diminishes us all.”
The president and vice president of the U.S. bishops conference released a joint statement in which they defended the rights of Muslims and promised that the Catholic Church would “not waver in her defense of our sisters and brothers of all faiths who suffer at the hands of merciless persecutors.”
“Welcoming the stranger and those in flight is not one option among many in the Christian life. It is the very form of Christianity itself,” Cardinal Daniel DiNardo, president of the conference, and Archbishop José Gomez, the vice president, continued. “Our actions must remind people of Jesus.”
The mood among some Catholic leaders may shift yet again. The president is expected to announce his nominee to the Supreme Court Tuesday night. During the campaign, Mr. Trump promised to appoint someone who holds pro-life views.
Mr. Pence said last week that the nominee would be a person “who will uphold the God-given liberties enshrined in our Constitution in the tradition of the late and great Justice Antonin Scalia.”
If that promise comes to fruition, expect again a flurry of statements from some Catholic circles addressing the president—only this time with a return to a more favorable tone.
UPDATE, Feb. 1: Several other Catholic groups have also released statements opposing President Trump’s executive orders.
Jesuit Refugee Service/USA said the order inappropriately targets refugees from Syria and other Middle East countries in a way that unfairly scapegoats these groups. The timing of the policies, released during Holocaust Remembrance week, reflects a lack of compassionate leadership, the organization said in a Jan. 27 statement.
“These provisions fly in the face of the core American values of welcoming persecuted families and individuals who come to America to rebuild their lives in safety and dignity and to contribute to the richness of our communities,” the statement said.
The Catholic Theological Society of America board members called President Trump’s executive orders on refugees “[M]orally unjust and religiously dangerous.” In a Jan. 31 statement, they wrote that the president’s actions “violates both the norms of Christian ethics and the human rights that all can affirm no matter what their faith.”
“Our duties to refugees and other severely vulnerable migrants is also based on the conviction that every man, woman, and child is created in the image and likeness of God and has a dignity that must be respected by all,” the board wrote. The statement highlighted the importance of regulated borders, but noted that “national borders, however, never set absolute limits to our moral duties to other human beings, especially when they are in great danger.” Wyatt Massey
RE: "What will I do for the people living in fear who cannot come home right now to America where they live, who feel threatened?"
From what I gather from the media, the ban on returning aliens who are valid immigrants with valid visas and passports was implemented sloppily and without common sense. I believe that functionaries below Trump wittingly (conspiracy theory?) or unwittingly failed to implement the sense of the order. Or, perhaps the order was too broad and vague. No such person should have been detained, and certainly not treated as criminal suspects.
I read where many people believe that Mohammedans are being targeted. Maybe. But, on the other hand, I read that the order pertained only to the same countries that had previously been identified by the past administration. The difference being that this administration took an action.
I would like to see more facts in the media.
This order came from the president. He implemented it with no warning, which meant that people who had authorization to enter the USA had that authorization revoked while they were in flight. Blaming the sloppiness of the order on underlings is unwarranted.
President Trump ordered the enforcement of an existing law passed by Congress, signed by President Obama who added several added Countries to the list of terrorist. States. Since when is enforcing an existing Federal law an offenseagainst law abiding American citizens. Do the research, learn the facts before judging the President. There was no requirement to announce his action.
All of the craziness and hate evident in Donald Trump now was evident during the campaign. Tacitly endorsing him because he was "pro-life" was a major mistake and we are living with the consequences.
It is my recollection that the institutions of the Church engaged in a very even view of the Obama Administration.....certainly didn't go verbally "ballistic"over Obama extreme pro abortion positions at home ( late term abortions!)and abroad (Mexico City Policy restored) nor his disdain for the Hyde Amendment,nor his suing The little Sisters of the Poor. There were no priests stopping in mid aisle before Mass announcing their fear for the future!
NO.......They cheered instead what they viewed as Obama's redistributionist "social justice" policies: free health care and tax policies,welfare rule changes etc. They quietly let lie his pro abortion stance and policies.
Now comes the Trump Administration which received very quiet and restrained applause for its pro life activities and then a blistering series of headlines emanating from church affiliated conferences and articles in America Magazine.
Now read the headlines and quotes in America Magazine during JUST THE FIRST 10 days of the Trump Administration .Right to Life policies forgotten ....replaced by A shrieking emphasis on the perceived apocalypse of a immigration suspension , claims of anti Muslim action, threat of repeal of Obamacare,etc etc.
WHY?
Clerical Hysteria over the perceived interruption by the Trump Administration of the church leaders preferred overarching, all important "Redistributionist/ Social Justice" policy. See all the America Magazine articles bashing "imperialistic capitalism".
Where is the balance that was carefully crafted for Pres Obama?
We are 10 DAYS INTO THIS ! Get a grip! By forgetting to be balanced You risk literally "throwing the babies out with the bathwater"! Think it's worth that?
Exactly. Do not be fooled by America's false veneer of impartiality. They never showed this kind of outrage towards Obama. (Also, how does the author prove that the Catholic mood has shifted?) Trump has sloppily proposed that we hold off until a better vetting process has been established. (The green card episodes were ridiculous.) Many refuse to believe that there is a strain in Islam that has no problem with violence furthering the faith, and I've yet to see "moderate" Islam speak out and reclaim their faith from the radicals. I, for one, don't want to see open borders where nobody is vetted, and I'm not ashamed to say it.
So our past president who recently abandoned immigrants from Cuba, through the Wet feet, dry feet policy, gets no grief by many organizations but our current president does through his "new" policy? Hypocrisy at its finest...
Stuart, Kevin, Wayne,
Get a grip. Read last Sunday's Gospel. Breathe. Reflect. Read again. Then tell me how it connects with what we are seeing from this 2 week old administration. Remember, read it, reflect on it, and breathe.
Barry
Heard it in Church
Read it again
Exactly how does it effect the bias in headlines and content of AMERICA MAGAZINE?
My comment was directed to the lack of balance AMERICA MAG demonstrates when it picks and chooses what immigration issues it focuses on now vs earlier under Obama.
And my comment was also directed at the headlines and choices of stories which AMERICA MAG has in general rolled out over the past week.
Finally you seem to assume I agree with the Trump immigration policy. Whether I do or don't is irrelevant to the critique of overwhelming bias that AMERICA MAGAZINE has been demonstrating. It's entirely consistent to disagree with the Trump immigration policies and still recognize the bias noted as well as the hypocrisy of ignoring the same issues under the prior Obama administration.....Check out the totals of Syrian refuges that the Obama administration took in for the past 5 years. They were negligible in number until last year,an election year, when he was burnishing his accomplishments for posterity. Notably Pres Obama would be long gone and out from under any consequences of this sudden increase in Syrian Refugees. Did you read anything in AMERICA MAGAZINE pointing out this historic lack of empathy by President Obama until last year ----years after the refugee crisis began.
Barry
Heard it in Church
Read it again
Exactly how does it effect the bias in headlines and content of AMERICA MAGAZINE?
My comment was directed to the lack of balance AMERICA MAG demonstrates when it picks and chooses what immigration issues it focuses on now vs earlier under Obama.
And my comment was also directed at the headlines and choices of stories which AMERICA MAG has in general rolled out over the past week.
Finally you seem to assume I agree with the Trump immigration policy. Whether I do or don't is irrelevant to the critique of overwhelming bias that AMERICA MAGAZINE has been demonstrating. It's entirely consistent to disagree with the Trump immigration policies and still recognize the bias noted as well as the hypocrisy of ignoring the same issues under the prior Obama administration.....Check out the totals of Syrian refuges that the Obama administration took in for the past 5 years. They were negligible in number until last year,an election year, when he was burnishing his accomplishments for posterity. Notably Pres Obama would be long gone and out from under any consequences of this sudden increase in Syrian Refugees. Did you read anything in AMERICA MAGAZINE pointing out this historic lack of empathy by President Obama until last year ----years after the refugee crisis began.
Stuart, Kevin, Wayne,
Get a grip. Read last Sunday's Gospel. Breathe. Reflect. Read again. Then tell me how it connects with what we are seeing from this 2 week old administration. Remember, read it, reflect on it, and breathe.
Well, some bishops have finally woken up to see that Mr. Trump is indeed the vile, biased, self-centered and mean spirited President he promised to be. Fairness, Justice, and devotion to the common good and the Kingdom of God do not appear on his agenda. Wait till he begins to attack government programs that help the homeless, hungry, unemployed, foreign born, and any progressive politico. The entire world is disgusted.
Where was the outrage over President Obama' order barring immigration of refugees from Cuba? And compare bishops' responses to the Trump order versus Obama's order:
The bishops stated they "strongly oppose" Trump's executive order: "The executive order virtually shuts down the refugee admissions program for 120 days, reduces the number of refugees to be admitted to the United States this year from 110,000 to 50,000 individuals, and indefinitely suspends the resettlement of Syrian refugees. …"
http://www.usccb.org/news/2017/17-026.cfm
While in regard to the abrupt ban on refugees from Cuba the bishops were merely "disappointed over the Administration's sudden policy change to end the 'Wet Foot/ Dry Foot' policy for Cuban arrivals."
http://www.usccb.org/news/2017/17-008.cfm
(By the way, the limitation of refugees to 50,000 was the limit in effect for the previous 15 years.)
See also: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/22/world/americas/cubans-us-border-policy-wet-foot-dry-foot-obama-trump.html?_r=0&module=ArrowsNav&contentCollection=Americas&action=keypress®ion=FixedLeft&pgtype=article :
"She spent weeks hiking through the Amazon, crossing a crocodile-filled river. She scaled border walls, escaped from immigration detention in Panama and slept in a church. Broke, hungry and exhausted, she found refuge with indigenous people in the jungle who took her in and fed her for a week.
Finally, six months after fleeing Cuba on a tortuous journey to the United States, Marleni Barbier, a dental assistant from Havana, made it to the border with Texas — about 12 hours too late.
More than 1,000 Cuban migrants who endured monthslong treks across as many as 10 countries to reach the United States are marooned in Mexico, halted by the Obama administration’s decision this month to end special immigration privileges for Cubans who make it to the American border.
The abrupt change is a profound one for Cubans, who fled their country by the tens of thousands in the last year to take advantage of a decades-old policy that permitted them to enter the United States."
------
Also, where were the protests in regard to the Obama administration 6 month ban on immigration from Iraq in 2011
See:
http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/al-qaeda-kentucky-us-dozens-terrorists-country-refugees/story?id=20931131
"As a result of the Kentucky case (involving two terrorist who were admitted as refugees) the State Department stopped processing Iraq refugees for six months in 2011, federal officials told ABC News – even for many who had heroically helped U.S. forces as interpreters and intelligence assets. One Iraqi who had aided American troops was assassinated before his refugee application could be processed, because of the immigration delays, two U.S. officials said. In 2011, fewer than 10,000 Iraqis were resettled as refugees in the U.S., half the number from the year before, State Department statistics show."
President Trump's order similarly was based on findings by Obama administration officials:
See https://homeland.house.gov/press/nations-top-security-officials-concerns-on-refugee-vetting/
James B. Comey, Director, Federal Bureau of Investigation, Department of Justice: “We can only query against that which we have collected. And so if someone has not made a ripple in the pond in Syria on a way that would get their identity or their interests reflected in our databases, we can query our databases until the cows come home but nothing will show up because we have no record of that person…You can only query what you have collected. And with respect to Iraqi refugees, we had far more in our databases because of our country’s work there for a decade. [The case of vetting Syrian refugees] is a different situation.” (10/21/15)
Jeh C. Johnson, Secretary, U.S. Department of Homeland Security: “It is true that we are not going to know a whole lot about the Syrians that come forth in this process… That is definitely a challenge….We know that organizations like ISIL might like to exploit this [Syrian refugee resettlement] program…The good news is that we are better at [vetting] than we were eight years ago. The bad news is that there is no risk-free process.” (10/21/15)
Nicholas J. Rasmussen, Director, National Counterterrorism Center, Office of the Director of National Intelligence: “The intelligence picture we’ve had of this [Syrian] conflict zone isn’t what we’d like it to be…you can only review [refugees’ submitted background data] against what you have.” (10/8/15)
James B. Comey, Director, Federal Bureau of Investigation, U.S. Department of Justice: “There is risk associated with bringing anybody in from the outside, but especially from a conflict zone like [Syria]… My concern there [about bringing Syrian refugees into the United States] is that there are certain gaps I don’t want to talk about publicly in the data available to us.” (10/8/15)
Jeh C. Johnson, Secretary, U.S. Department of Homeland Security: “But [the Syrian refugees are] a population of people that we’re not going to know a whole lot about.” (10/8/15)
Gen. (ret.) John Allen, Special Presidential Envoy for the Global Coalition to Counter ISIL, State Department: “We should be conscious of the potential that [ISIS] may attempt to embed agents within that [Syrian refugee] population.” (9/11/15)
Gen. (ret.) James Clapper, Director, Director of National Intelligence: “As [Syrian refugees] descend on Europe, one of the obvious issues that we worry about, and in turn as we bring refugees into this country, is exactly what’s their background? We don’t obviously put it past the likes of ISIL to infiltrate operatives among these refugees…That is a huge concern of ours.” (9/9/15)
Michael Steinbach, Assistant Director for the Federal Bureau of Investigation: “Yes, I’m concerned [about bringing Syrian refugees into the United States]…We’ll have to go take a look at those lists and go through all of those intelligence holdings and be very careful to try and identify connections to foreign terrorist groups…in Iraq, we were there on the ground collecting [intelligence], so we had databases to use…You have to have information to vet, so the concern is in Syria is that we don’t have the systems in places on the ground to collect the information.” (2/12/15)
Nicholas J. Rasmussen , Director, National Counterterrorism Center, Office of the Director of National Intelligence: “[The Syrian refugees are] clearly a population of concern…what we want to be able to do is apply the full weight of U.S. intelligence community holdings to the vetting and screening process so that we can unearth any information that we may have in our holdings that gives us concern about particular individuals.” (2/12/15)
Francis X. Taylor, Under Secretary, Intelligence and Analysis, Department of Homeland Security: “We are concerned about any group of people coming to the United States who may be coming to the United States for nefarious purposes…[officials] want to make sure that if we are asked to vet individuals from any part of the world to come to the United States, that we have applied the most rigorous screening that’s available within the U.S. government.” (2/12/15)
As acknowledged by Pope Francis: "… Can borders be controlled? Yes, each country has the right to control its borders, who comes and who goes, and those countries at risk —from terrorism or such things— have even more the right to control them more, but no country has the right to deprive its citizens of the possibility to talk with their neighbors."
http://www.ncregister.com/blog/edward-pentin/pope-francis-takes-will-wait-and-see-attitude-towards-president-trump
See also: http://www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/comment/trumps-migrant-ban-is-a-defence-of-freedom-2wdn6b9p6
Excerpt:
Mr Trump, … is being treated like a monster who has committed a crime against humanity.
This is ridiculous at every level. First, the measure is not a Muslim ban. Access to the US by the vast majority of the world’s Muslims will remain unchanged. The order doesn’t target people for their religion or nationality. It is aimed solely at countering the terrorist threat to America. The temporary seven-states ban allows for more rigorous vetting of individuals from those countries who are seeking entry to the US.
The threat from these states is acute. Last November a radicalised Ohio State University student, Abdul Razak Ali Artan, ploughed a car into a campus crowd and stabbed people with a butcher’s knife. He was a Somali refugee who came to the US in 2014.
Last June the CIA director John Brennan told a Congressional hearing that refugee flows were a route for terrorist infiltration. Last December, the chief of the defence staff, Air Chief Marshal Sir Stuart Peach, warned that Islamic State jihadists were “moving in migrant flows, hiding in plain sight”.
So Mr Trump is merely heeding urgent, vital and informed advice. Moreover, the hypocrisy and historical amnesia among those baying for his head are quite extraordinary. The seven-state list was actually drawn up by the Obama administration to suspend the visa-waiver for travellers from those countries for the same reason: to keep America safe.
In 2011, Mr Obama all but stopped admitting Iraqi refugees for six months while vetting was drastically overhauled. This followed the discovery by the FBI of evidence that several dozen Iraqi terrorists had infiltrated the US via the refugee programme. Yet no one attacked Mr Obama as a disgusting anti-Muslim bigot. …
President Trump is stopping Syrian refugees because he fears they may harbour terrorists. This fear is well-founded. All Mr Trump is doing, in fact, is returning to the Obama administration’s practice from 2011 to 2014 when it admitted very few Syrian refugees. …
Those in the grip of this unbridled rage aren’t even consistent or coherent. As punishment for his supposed offence of banning people from America, they want to ban him from Britain. Mr Trump wants to ban people because he fears they may murder American citizens. More than one million Britons want to ban Mr Trump just because they think he’s a horrible person.
This is virtue signalling on steroids. The hypocrisy is nauseating. The flight from reason is terrifying.
The great danger to the world isn’t Donald Trump. It’s the threat by Islamists — aided and abetted by those have appeased these enemies of the west for years, and who have been sent totally wild by a US president who dares to want to defend freedom instead.