By: Jay Sorgi
One out of every five Catholics in America are at risk of being deported, a USCCB-sponsored study says
“We were unwanted in our country of origin and now we are unwanted here. Where do we go?”
Countless people of faith are working to change the words Kiona Medina has often heard in her daily ministry. Medina, Susan Reed and Olivia Sharkey – three deeply devout Catholic women – encounter some of the tens of millions of people of God at risk of suffering the effects of deportation, from the East Bay to the East Coast.
“We meet the neighbor, the newcomer to Philadelphia, and we try to accompany them,” says Olivia Sharkey, the executive director of the Sisters of St. Joseph of Philadelphia. “We accompany every dear neighbor without distinction.”
The sisters offer English and citizenship classes, along with legal immigration services. But they have had to change the way they operate, due to the fear of ICE raids that target any location where immigrants might gather.
“We’ve seen some of our students need to shift from in-person classes to online classes due to fear in the political climate of leaving their home, and also going to a center that is known to be supporting immigrants,” Sharkey said. “We’ve been trying to balance that.”
As director of the Michigan Immigrant Rights Center, Reed and her team confront the imbalance for those in her state who fear being rounded up, having their human rights violated, and being forced from their homeland.
For Reed, the lack of balance also runs rampant among what she sees as heavily shifted beliefs of a large percentage of Catholics in America.
“As Christians, we take care of each other.”
–Bishop Michael C. Barber, SJ
“It’s really astonishing to have lived a change where I feel like so many, in so many Catholic communities, the idea that our brothers and sisters are being treated unjustly is considered some kind of political notion and not just like a basic reality that we know through our life and our love, through our life and our love and our lived relationships,” said Reed, the descendant of a few among the millions of Irish immigrants, many of whom were mistreated during the 19th and 20th centuries in America.
Medina, the Diocese of Oakland coordinator of Life and Justice Ministries, sees that mistreatment and fear today among Catholics of Latino and other backgrounds today in parishes, half of which she says include Spanish-speaking Masses.
“If there is no legal federal protection that can guarantee their safety from deportation, then these folks – many of whom have lived in this country for many years and have families and stability – they’re in a high state of fear and anxiety,” said Medina, whose background is in community mental health.
“Families are being exposed to the risk of being broken apart. They don’t want to lose their job or be at the risk of deportation, so they’re not working. Therefore, less income is coming into the household. Therefore, less food is coming onto their families’ plates. It’s a chain reaction.”
“I live everything with Jesus. If I am to be deported, I will be deported with Jesus.”
World Relief, a U.S.-based global Christian humanitarian organization, released a report earlier this year entitled “One Part of the Body: The Potential Impact of Deportations on American Christian Families” that was partially sponsored by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.
It says that approximately one out of every five Catholics in America, and up to 10 million Christians in total, are at risk of being deported – about 80 percent of all who are at risk. Seven million people in America are also in danger of losing a family member to deportation if immigration laws don’t change.
“The title of this report comes right out of 1 Corinthians 12, where the apostle Paul describes the church as one body with many interdependent members. He says that when one part of the body suffers, every part suffers with it,” said World Relief Vice President of Advocacy and Policy Matthew Soerens.
“Most Christians want us to find ways to have secure borders, to have orderly legal immigration processes, and yet still to respect the unity of the family and treat all people humanely.”
Soerens has seen many instances of pushback against church members “who have not committed crimes being picked up by masked officers of the U.S. government on the street and being held in detention centers.”
The dioceses of Nashville and San Bernardino have offered dispensation from weekly Mass attendance to those who fear deportation, while some of those already brought into detention are not even allowed to practice their faith – they are not even being allowed to be deported with Jesus.
“Really troubling reports of being denied religious visitation, like Catholic bishops unable to access the so-called Alligator Alcatraz facility just to, like, provide the Eucharist,” said Soerens. “There was one incredible report of someone having their Bible taken away in that facility.“
“Even just sharing my immigration story with people that don’t know what it’s like already gives me hope.”
The same Biblical passage spawning the World Relief report led to Diocese of Oakland Bishop Michael C. Barber sharing the call to companionship and accompaniment with America’s 10 million Christians who are at risk of deportation – a way of giving them hope in Christ amidst their struggle.
“If [one] part suffers, all the parts suffer with it; if one part is honored, all the parts share its joy. Now you are Christ’s body, and individually parts of it,’” Diocese of Oakland Bishop Michael C. Barber, SJ made clear in his remarks at immigration prayer services in August.
“As Christians, we take care of each other.”
Bishop Barber’s remarks also cite three particular areas where Catholics are called to respond. One involves contacting legislators to work across the aisle for comprehensive immigration reform.
“Get to know each other, sit in a circle and listen to one another. That’s not just helping, that’s being children of God, under the same Father, under the same Body of Christ.”
–Kiona Medina, diocesan coordinator of Life and Justice Ministries
But to even get to that step, Bishop Barber believes the first two steps involve making the faith-filled community a united one, and one that is not so siloed by geography, ethnicity and social background.
“We come together. We come to the Lord to pray and ask His divine assistance. Jesus Christ is the source of all power and goodness and life,” Bishop Barber says. “We share with our neighbors our situation.”
His words may reflect those of Pope Leo XIV’s episcopal motto, “In the One, we are one.” In the current American climate, those words feel like an incredible but necessary challenge.
“The American church, to some extent, is somewhat segregated. I may see only 1 in 20 in a particular parish think they’re vulnerable to deportation, because it’s 1 in 3 in a parish across town,” said Soerens.
“From a Christian theological perspective, it is so important that we don’t have such a localized view of the church, that we don’t miss that those folks across town are just as much a part of the body of Christ as the people who might be sitting next to me on a given Sunday.”
Both Bishop Barber and Soerens advocate for the work of companionship in our everyday faith lives, the kind that Sharkey, Reed and Medina do in their Catholic-centered careers from Philadelphia to Oakland.
“This idea of unioning love, this ever-working process, it is active, it is continuous, so we continuously ask ourselves, what more can we do to bring about unity? How do we meet the needs of today?” said Sharkey.
“The need of today is a call for unity, one that is taking a pause to listen, to learn someone’s name, to see the human, and not just the statistic or not just the news headline, but to see the human in front of us.”
“Pastorally, we should be reaching out, trying to understand what the current emergent needs are within our communities and outside our communities,” Reed adds.
“That’s supporting legal assistance and legal defense for folks to keep their families together, responding to heads of household being detained and removed, making plans with newer arrivals who thought they had a path to permanence who are really facing the likelihood that they can’t stay.”
“Who should I help? Why should I help? What does our gospel say? If you live in whatever parish, what does it look like for proximity and accessibility to be the guidelines of your charity? If that is too far, we still don’t speak to each other,” says Medina.
“Get to know each other, sit in a circle and listen to one another. That’s not just helping, that’s being children of God, under the same Father, under the same Body of Christ.”
Parishes and individuals can find resources for legal services, free social services, along with preparation guides on our diocesan website: www.oakdiocese.org/immigration.