My dear brothers and sisters in Christ,

The Feast of the Epiphany, which we celebrate this Sunday, has been the occasion in the United States to mark the beginning of National Migration Week.  In our own Diocese we commemorate Diocesan Migration Day later on in the year, as do many other dioceses.  National Migration Week reflects the practice of the Holy See, which for over 93 years has chosen a day on which to pray for migrants. 

The great migration to the United States began over 100 years ago and continues to be an important element of our society.  It seems that our low birthrate makes the addition of new workers critical to our enormous stability.  Almost all economists seem to agree with this analysis.  It is not immigrant workers, however, who are celebrating Migration Week, but rather immigrant families. Families are the moral foundation of our society and Church.  In fact, this year’s theme, chosen by Pope Benedict XVI, is exactly that:  “The Migrant Family.”

It has been a long tradition in the Church to compare each migrant family with the Holy Family of Nazareth in exile.  The famous encyclical by Pope Pius XII in 1952 has that very title:  “The Exile Family.”  In a statement, Pope Benedict said:  “The Family of Nazareth reflects the image of God safeguarded in the heart of every human family, even if disfigured and weakened by emigration.”  Yes, emigration in itself is not something without its downside. Catholic and social teaching has made it clear over the past decades that people have a right to migrate to sustain their lives and the lives of their families.  At the same time, a country has the right to regulate its borders and to control migration.  This must be done, however, in view of the common good, that is, the common good of the migrants who come and the society that accepts them. 

Although there are many voices today that tell us that migrants are the cause of every evil in our society, social scientists are hard put to identify too many downsides that come from the presence of migrants.  A particular problem we face is that of undocumented or unregulated migration.  The current estimates are that 10 to 12 million persons are in the United States in an undocumented status; most are working, but many are spouses, children and other family members who participate in the life of our society.  It is a fact that most undocumented people are forced to be out of legal status because our current laws give them no opportunity to come here legally to join their families. Tremendous backlogs in processing, and complicated documentation almost impossible to obtain in other countries, causes people to come without proper authorization. They all would be here legally if our immigration legal system were structured differently.

The recent raid in the meat packing industry in six of our Western states brought to our attention the wholesale replacement of American workers with new immigrant workers, many of whom are undocumented.  It is not an easy life to work in meat packing plants, often working in a refrigerator eight to ten hours a day.  It is not work that most American-born citizens will accept, almost at any wage.  In recent years, the older American-born workers have left the meat packing industry, replaced not by their children, as they were at one time, but by immigrant workers.  The children of U.S.-born workers have sought a better life and better paying jobs that are not so difficult.  Who can blame them?  At the same time, there are many jobs in our economy that traditionally have been filled by entry-level immigrants. 

My own long history in dealing with immigration brings me to conclude that undocumented or unregulated migration is not good for the country and certainly not for individual migrants themselves and their families.  The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB), in union with the Church, has been calling for comprehensive legal immigration reform, which includes the regulation of those undocumented immigrants here, and at the same time fixing our broken immigration system to allow for a reasonable flow of immigrants, especially those needed to fill gaps in our labor market.  President Bush has suggested a temporary worker program, which has some benefits, but also some downsides.

The Church’s main concern involves the unification of families and the better opportunities that can be offered both to foreign students at American universities, exposing future leaders of other countries to the higher professional job market, as well as to those who will fill available jobs.

Unfortunately, the gridlock in Congress last year made it impossible for any reasonable legislation to be passed.  The hope is that 2007 will see needed reforms made to our immigration system.  Only a reasonable approach to this matter will truly resolve some of the issues before us.  Unfortunately, some people, including those in the media, use this issue to gain ratings or public fame.  If only the media were comprehensive in their reporting, a just reform of immigration policies might gain better public support that could be translated into legislative initiatives that truly meet the problem.           

Another issue that is especially troubling to the Church is the proposal to build a 700-mile fence along part of the U.S.-Mexican border that is supposed to stem the tide of undocumented migration.  Would that this were an easy solution.  It seems that walls and fences do not make good neighbors, to paraphrase Robert Frost and his poem “Mending Wall.”  Recently, Cardinal Renato Martino, president of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, called the building of the wall “an inhuman project.”  A major news network quickly criticized him for meddling in political affairs. When moral issues are involved, however, the Church is compelled to speak out with the voice of reason. 

The Church does not propose to have a solution to the longstanding problem of migration; it proposes to bring a moral perspective and reason to the legislative and political process that is responsible for finding a solution that defends the common good. The common good involves knowing who is here and what people are doing, not having millions of people hiding and living in the shadows for fear of apprehension.

Just as migration is almost by definition an exercise in putting out into the deep, so too the Church, as it insists on justice for immigrants, must take risks and be criticized for it.  Last year, the USCCB began a “Justice for Immigrants” campaign, which can be located at its Web site, www.justiceforimmigrants.org.  The Web site does answer most of the questions that are hard to understand in our society.  The reforms which must take place will also put an end to those who exploit immigrants by selling them false documents, by underpaying them for an honest day’s work and by trafficking in transporting people through the desert at great risk to their lives. Those who exploit must recognize the human dignity of each person.

Join me this coming week in praying for laws that maintain an open society free from terrorist attacks, yet welcome migrant families wishing to make a new life for themselves.

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