VATICAN (CNS) : As immigration becomes an increasingly hot-button political issue, Pope Francis again underscored the moral weight of how migrants are treated, hammering home a message of acceptance that has been a pillar of his pontificate for more than a decade.
Soon after his election in 2013, the pope made it clear that immigration was an issue of the utmost importance both to him personally and to the entire church by choosing the island of Lampedusa, Italy, a landing point for migrants entering Europe, as the destination for his first trip outside of the Vatican.
During his weekly general audience on August 28, unprompted by any specific event, Pope Francis deviated from his usual catechesis series to discuss the plight of migrants.
This came two months after European parliamentary elections saw significant gains for parties in Italy, France and Germany touting hardline immigration policies, and some two months out from the US presidential election in which immigration is a major policy touchpoint.
The pope sternly criticised those who obstruct migrants from finding peace and security in a new country.
“It needs to be said clearly: There are those who systematically work by all means to drive away migrants, and this, when done knowingly and deliberately, is a grave sin,” Pope Francis said.
It needs to be said clearly: There are those who systematically work by all means to drive away migrants, and this, when done knowingly and deliberately, is a grave sin
Pope Francis
The pope continued by criticising “more restrictive laws” around migration and the “militarisation of borders” as ineffective methods of reducing global migration flows, instead calling for “safe and legal access routes for migrants” and a “global governance of migration based on justice, fraternity, persecution and solidarity.”
Although always insisting migrants and refugees be treated with dignity, the pope’s latest message appears to be an escalation.
He ruffled feathers in 2015 when he said that a person who thinks only of building walls and not of building bridges is “not Christian,” in response to a reporter’s question on Donald Trump’s candidacy for the presidency. During a 2019 flight to Panama, Pope Francis told a reporter that the fear of migrants “makes us crazy,” and in a May 2024 interview with 60 Minutes, he called efforts by the state of Texas to shut down a Catholic charity working to support migrants “madness.”
Still, the bite behind his latest remarks made headlines in a way that his routine messages and homilies on migration, filled with appeals to see Christ in the face of migrants, have not.
The media attention may be attributable to the intensifying global debate on immigration or the fierceness of his recent remarks. But for Vatican-watchers, Pope Francis’ pointed statement—especially his use of the phrase, “grave sin”—and his condemnation of certain policies prompt a critical question as he enters what some are considering the “legacy” phase of his pontificate: Is his most forceful language on migration yet to come?
