Posted on 09/15/2010 1:12:03 PM PDT by NoLibZone
One of the most depressing trends in British and American politics is that opponents of immigration are currently winning the debate. In Britain the government is in the process of instituting, over the objections on Vincent Cable, a draconian cap on non-EU immigration. Similarly, all the major candidates for the Labour leadership have hardened their stances on immigration, although David Miliband has had the courage to criticise the cap.
The situation is even worse in American since Jan Brewer's crackdown on suspected illegal immigrants turned her into an icon of the right, and resurrected her re-election campaign. President Obama has stated that, "being an American is not a matter of blood or birth", an indication that an end to birthright citizenship may be part of any future immigration reform.
However, the Catholic church is prepared to stand up for some of the most vulnerable in society. In Britain, Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor has courageously led the fight for an amnesty for illegal immigrants. In both America and Canada the church is constantly on the immigration frontline, providing, legal advice, charitable assistance and even sanctuary, for those who have crossed the border to seek a better life.
The Catholic church has also taken a principled stance against Sarkozy's attempts to boost his flagging popularity by expelling Roma immigrants. Indeed, in a speech to last month, Pope Benedict implicitly rebuked the French president's efforts, reminding his audience that "Jesus came to pull together men from every nation and speaking every language".
This is not a new stance. Indeed, successive popes have emphasised the importance of welcoming immigrants. As far back 1891 the church clearly stated that people had a right to move freely, and that any government attempts to restrict immigration had to be done humanely. Similarly, Pope John Paul II, Benedict's predecessor, emphasised that "the migrant is not merely an individual to be respected in accordance with the norms established by law, but a person whose presence challenges them and whose needs become an obligation for their responsibility".
Cynics have argued that the relatively greater religiosity of immigrants means that the church's progressive stance is partly self-interested. Indeed, eastern Europeans and Latinos are an increasingly large part of parishes in Europe and America respectively. However, the church has consistently stood up for the rights of all immigrants, not just co-religionists. Indeed the pope has explicitly talked about "building relations of mutual knowledge and respect" with immigrants from different faiths, while he has intervened in the debate in Italy to support the rights of Muslim immigrants from North Africa. Indeed, the Los Angeles Times recently pointed out that Catholic charities in France even run halal soup kitchens.
Of course the church cannot shift attitudes on its own. However, its principled stance on this issue on provides a call to action. Those on the centre, left-of-centre and left should stand up for a more dignified treatment of asylum seekers and immigration policies that give those currently living in poorer countries the opportunity to improve their standard of living by moving to the United Kingdom. It is also ironic that while many of the church's critics attack it for being out of touch with modern values, its decision to choose principles over popularity has put it at the forefront of the immigration debate.
LOL
Oh boy where do we start. Ever heard of 4th century Rome, almost 100% ROMAN Catholic and had 100's of thousands of Slaves. The Catholic Spanish and Portuguese for about 200 years were the number one transporter and consumer of African Slaves to the New World. The whole damn Catholic European Feudal system, was basically slavery. The Abolitionist movement in America was basically a Protestant movement. Much more of a case to be made that Protestantism was much more antislavery than Roman Catholicism. My you are an ignoramus and it's "immigrant" you illiterate troll.
The bottom line is that Protestants vote Republican and Catholics vote Democrat. the Protestant vote went Democrat in 1964, and again in 1936.
That even applies to Hispanics, the Catholic Hispanics are overwhelmingly supportive of the Democrat party while the Protestant Hispanics are about a 50/50 vote.
Bush won the Catholic vote, as did Reagan.
Accordingly, a whole lot more can be done to improve the living standards of mankind by encouraging them to adopt the western model of economics than in bringing the third world here.
you’d think they’d want to clean up their own messes first.
Exactly! The same position of the Catholic church, regardless of whatever this guy is spouting off on.
You should know how to spell immigrant, you filthy SLAVE-MASTER... You probably have a couple of them cleaning the diarrhea out your dirty little toilet in your trailer right now... you Loser!
Legal or illegal?
I respect Benedict, but I don't really think Jesus meant that all people from other countries were supposed to come to the U.S. illegally.
They are always looking for someone else to blame for their own dirty deeds.
Bush lost the Catholic vote to Al Gore, for reelection, Bush won 52% of the Catholic vote in 2004, an election in which Bush won 56% of the Protestant Hispanic vote, in 2008 the Catholic vote went back to Obama by 54%, Protestant Hispanics voted for Obama by 52%.
Tell that to the secularists who took over the stuff we built!
We used to run the schools, run the hospitals, run the charities, then the state intervened and took it all.
Illegal.
Legal is fine and a benefit to the nation.
I’d love to read of the Church’s anti illegal immigration positions.
Thank you.
How many Evangelical/Protestants are there on the US Supreme Court?
Which organization is the largest most powerful Christian body in the US?
Thank you.
Hey, you can have Harriet Miers. I’ll stick with Alito
Compared to other plantation owners in the area, when it came to slavery, “The Jesuits were no better or worse,” according to Cloke. Many of the slaves had been gifts from wealthy Catholic families to sustain the Church. The abolition of slavery was not an issue in the area until the early nineteenth century, when Georgetown’s Jesuits became deeply divided over the issue of slavery.“But they were not conflicted in the way you would want,” Cloke said. “They were conflicted over what to do about the threat of abolitionists.”
...Abolitionists presented an economic rather than moral problem for these Jesuits. With a growing abolitionist presence in Maryland, some of them feared a devaluation of their property, their slaves. Maryland was a state in which slavery had a tenuous hold, the economy was no longer driven by slave labor. According to reports, the general debt of the mission was close to $32,000 by the 1830s, a large sum for the time.
“It was not a market for growing crops, but for growing slaves,” said Cloke. The real money was to be made not from the work a slave could do in Maryland, but from the hugely profitable business of selling the slaves downriver....
...Brother Mobberly, who served as an overseer on one of the estates, kept an extensive diary giving a bird’s eye view of the tension the Jesuits felt surrounding the issue of slavery. His diary explores the tension between Catholics, an already persecuted group, and the Presbyterians, Baptists, Quakers and Methodists who were outspokenly opposed to slavery. Mobberly, like other Jesuits, came to feel threatened and saw the issue as a Catholic-Protestant conflict. Involving everything from the Bible to Thomas Jefferson, Mobberly’s diary defended slavery. He explained that Abraham owned slaves, and wrote, “Abraham had God for his particular friend; and we do not read that God ever reproached him for keeping men in servitude. Therefore, it was lawful for him to possess them.”
In 1866 The Holy Office of Pope Pius IX affirmed that, subject to conditions, it was not against divine law for a slave to be sold, bought or exchanged.
“Gaudium es Spes, paras 27, 29 quoted by Maxwell 1975
Wow, not like the Church had plenty of land SEIZED from them.
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