By FR. KEVIN M. CUSICK
“ ‘Refugee children belong to their parents, not to the government or other institution. To steal children from their parents is a grave sin, immoral (and) evil,’ said San Antonio’s Archbishop Gustavo Garcia-Siller June 14 via Twitter, the social media platform he has used to daily call attention to the situation. ‘Their lives have already been extremely difficult. Why do we (the U.S.) torture them even more, treating them as criminals?’ he continued” (CNS).
To “steal” means to intentionally act to permanently separate another from his property. Surely the good archbishop does not intend to accuse others of such a sin? Such emotional hyperbole has been typical of the debate surrounding the well-being of the children at the border whose parents put them at risk by attempting to enter the U.S. illegally. Foes of the Trump administration have understandably been using the rhetoric of the bishops and now of the Pope to bolster their political maneuvering within the U.S. electoral landscape.
On the issue of protecting families no one should be opposed. But there is more than one issue at play. As quoted by CNS, Archbishop Alexander Sample of Portland, Ore., said:
“Whatever one thinks about the most prudent way to resolve our mounting immigration problems, mercy and charity dictate that we do not potentially cause irreparable harm and trauma when there is another way.”
Only a heartless person would disagree. The prospect of traumatized children, or children at risk because they are without the protection of their parents, is one we must avoid as much as possible. Our government should establish the highest standard of proof before ever contemplating separating any child from his or her parents, at the border or anywhere.
Daniel Cardinal DiNardo, in a brief statement, spoke to the morality at issue when separating families: “While protecting our borders is important, we can and must do better as a government, and as a society, to find other ways to ensure that safety. Separating babies from their mothers is not the answer and is immoral.”
Unfortunately, for those who are willing to consider all the facts, some children show up at the border with adults who are in fact not their parents and who have brought them not to keep a family together but to do the opposite for the purpose of exploiting them and exposing them to moral danger and threats to their lives.
Our DHS and police personnel face this stark reality on the ground at the border and our bishops have a moral duty to also speak to them and to help them do their job in a morally upright way, balancing both the good of the families on the other side of the border as well as protection of the families on the U.S. side of the border, who have already suffered much, to include loss of life, through a sloppy immigration system.
It is also pro-life to thoroughly check individuals at the border to stop human trafficking. This can only be done through the time afforded by detainment. Even our bishops’ own child protection policies mandate that children not be alone with adults other than their parents under any circumstances.
Yes, the Pope has now also weighed in on the “children at the border” crisis. The bishops met this month in Florida for their annual spring convocation and the issue of children being separated from their parents at the border consumed much of their time and attention.
The USCCB shortly thereafter issued a document which the Pope supports but which confuses the “right to life” with the right of flourishing within the family after birth. Children who have already been born are not always under threat of their lives when separated from their parents. The issue rather is the potential for damaging trauma. Calling attention to this real issue is not helped by confusing matters of life with matters of flourishing once born.
Of course children shouldn’t be separated from their parents. But they are all the time, unfortunately. We regularly separate children from their parents when they are sent to prison as a result of conviction for committing a crime. This is the work we have delegated to the justice system through those we have elected to represent us and appoint judges.
If the family must always be together under all circumstances, let me see shrill Democrats and fellow travelers institute family prisons so that whole families can be interned when one parent is convicted of a crime. Otherwise, judge not.
Everybody loves to be self-righteous, but using children to promote oneself is really despicable. No doubt some politicians may be manipulating the situation to use children for their self-promoting agenda.
The government always has a role. The Church advises but cannot supplant that role. There are areas where morals and faith overlap with the work of the government. Certainly matters affecting the good of individuals require the Church to speak out because matters of human rights are at the core of the Church’s mission.
As I write this, we have a reminder that no one in the Church has the moral high ground. There is breaking news that results of an investigation into Cardinal McCarrick’s behavior while a priest of the Archdiocese of New York has found credible allegations of abuse of a minor about five decades ago.
Some of our bishops admit in private that the sexual abuse issue was rooted in same-sex attraction but do not dare publicly mention that adult homosexuals sometimes pray on developing youth of various ages. There is too much at stake for such refreshing candor to win out, evidently. Every bishop who does not clarify the issues at stake by carefully choosing his language, in public speech or in writing, aids and abets the moral confusion which has led to boundary violations and criminal sexual abuse against minors and young adults in the past.
Has the confusing agenda of “LGBT” finally reached its apogee with publication of the Youth Synod instrumentum laboris? Commentators are exulting, with their clerical cheerleader James Martin, SJ, leading the way, that in the document “for the first time” the Vatican is using the term “LGBT.” The preferred term this far in the Catechism and other Church documents has been homosexuality or “same-sex attraction.”
The Pope is on record publicly affirming that only one man and one woman can form a true family. This places the LGBT agenda on the wrong side of history and outside the Church in the fight for authentic teaching in its attempts to replicate families with two “husbands” or two “wives” and their child accessories obtained by renting wombs or through adoption. We have the truth, a blessing none of us can deserve. Now we must gratefully follow it, bishops and laity. We have a moral duty before God as a Church to protect childhood both in policy and practice, in action and in speech, at the border of the U.S. and on the border of adulthood everywhere.
Thank you for reading and praised be Jesus Christ, now and forever. @MCITLFrAphorism
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