CASTEL GANDOLFO (SE): Pope Leo XIV has condemned recent anti-migrant measures in the United States, urging that people be treated “with humanity and dignity,” according to a Vatican News reported on November 18. Speaking to journalists, the Pope also addressed the November 13 statement released by the US Conference of Catholic Bishops during its plenary assembly in Baltimore [see page 12], describing the bishops’ remarks as “very important.”
The pope expressed appreciation for the bishops’ statement, calling it “very important.”
“I would like to invite all Catholics—and also people of good will—to listen carefully to what they have said. I believe we must seek ways of treating people with humanity, with the dignity that is theirs,” Vatican News reported the pope as saying.
He pointed out, “If someone is in the United States illegally, there are ways to address this. There are courts. There is a judicial system. I believe there are many problems in the system. No one has said that the United States should have open borders,” adding, “I think every country has the right to determine who enters, how, and when.”
However, the pope stressed, “when people have lived good lives—many of them for 10, 15, 20 years—treating them in a way that is, to say the least, extremely disrespectful, and with instances of violence, is troubling.”
Pope Leo concluded, “The bishops have been very clear. I would simply invite all Americans to listen to them.”
