“I suspect that’s covered by “respect the laws” of the host country (i.e. you can not enter a country illegally and show respect for its laws).”
It ought to be, but the two sides of the Roman Catholic Pope’s mouth as well as the Vatican’s mouth in general are never joined in the same breath to elicit the depth of any moral duty on the part of illegal migrants TO NOT BE illegal immigrants.
They talk about “respect for the law” when it’s convenient and leave out the importance of it at their choosing. On Sunday January 10, 2010, Benedict “called on Italians to respect the rights of immigrants”; while failing to make any distinction between legal and illegal immigrants, and any difference in THEIR moral duties. His words to Italian authorities were caused by incidents at the time in southern Italy - incidents involving nearly completely ILLEGAL immigrants. He condemned violence against the “immigrants” and said nothing of the two days of riotous violence on the part of the “immigrants”. In that message he made no call to the “immigrants” to “respect” the fact that they were NOT legal immigrants. He showed exactly what I said about NEVER joining the two issues IN THE SAME BREATH. It is clear they don’t really believe what they say about “respect for the law”.
It looks like the media coverage of the Pope's remarks were certainly skewed to be sympathetic to the illegals, but a little thoughtful digging shows that in addition to the limited quote you cite, in that very same speech he also said, "An immigrant is a human being, different in where they came from, in their culture and tradition, but a person to respect who has rights and responsibilities." Moreover, he didn't condemn "violence against the 'immigrants'," so much as he condemned violence, period. "Violence must never, for anyone, be the way to resolve differences."
You may disagree with the sentiment, as I do, but I don't see how those words in any way, absolve the violence of the illegals.