T
Trader
Guest
Yes, and it automatic whether the parents were here legally or not. I would love to know if any other country does this.
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catharina
Guest
If the Church is to maintain its non-profit status, it complies with US Law. However, a priest opening the rectory door to a hungry family of undocumented individuals has the same moral obligation to serve them - be it through referrals or goods-in-kind - that he would have to any family with legal papers.Of course it is. Jack was so frustrated by the logic(or lack of it) here that he has gone over to the dark side.
He missed one. When I pointed out that the Bishop of Fort Wayne-South Bend has taken great care to follow immigration law for importing Asian and African priests, he should have claimed that the bishops were morally obligated to disobey every aspect of such an unjust law.
Or maybe he believes that the bishop’s position on immigration has been misrepresented here?
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childofmary1143
Guest
This is a problem then with regard to illegal immigration. As I have heard and read about how parents who are illegally here want to stay here because their children are legally living here. As Catholics we should be appalled that a country, any country would create laws or prevent a parent from their minor children. That is a sin and I ask anyone how that can be morally allowed.
I wonder also if the same people who are so against illegal immigration (because it is against the law) would say the same thing if pro-lifers were arrested (against the law) for protesting outside an abortion clinic like Tillman or any others???
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verdigirl
Guest
I agree. It’s not even logical to expel the parents because we think they’re using up social services that others have to pay for, and yet create a situation in which a child becomes a ward of the state, which costs even more.
Better to let the parents of the “anchor babies” (Jack’s term) work toward legal residency so they can pay taxes and share the load.
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verdigirl
Guest
A few articles for your perusal:
From the Houston Catholic Worker site: cjd.org/paper/terror.html
From the Boston Globe:
boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2007/03/11/ap_impact_immigration_raids_split_families/
From the San Diego Union-Tribune
signonsandiego.com/uniontrib/20070312/news_1n12families.html
From Mexidata.info
mexidata.info/id1343.html
From the Denver Post:
denverpost.com/ci_4835267
From the Washington Post:
washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/10/22/AR2006102201121_pf.html
From the Houston Catholic Worker site: cjd.org/paper/terror.html
From the Boston Globe:
boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2007/03/11/ap_impact_immigration_raids_split_families/
From the San Diego Union-Tribune
signonsandiego.com/uniontrib/20070312/news_1n12families.html
From Mexidata.info
mexidata.info/id1343.html
From the Denver Post:
denverpost.com/ci_4835267
From the Washington Post:
washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/10/22/AR2006102201121_pf.html
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catharina
Guest
Verdigirl, I’ve only read the first (two) linked articles but have paused to say thanks to you. Once more, thank you.
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Trader
Guest
Personally, I am too old for this, but if I smuggled a pregnant girlfriend into Canada, would we all get to stay and use your national health care for life?
As for abortion protesters, protesting is not against the law. Trespassing, and all forms of violence from battery to murder are. If they commit those crimes they suffer the consequences. Some people have murdered aborton providers and claimed justification. I agree with the great moral philosopher who raised me(my mother), “Two wrongs do not make a right.”
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Trader
Guest
The Church has risked far more than its non-profit status in the past when faced with an unjust law. Rome had a law requiring worship of the emperor. Britain outlawed Catholic priests. Several communist countries prohibited all religious activities. Uncounted martyrs defied unjust laws through the last 20 centuries.
Some other options the priest would have for a family of undocumented individuals would be a referal to an immigration lawyer to get legal status, or aid to return to their home country. He has no obligation to turn them in nor any oblgation to conceal them from the authorities.
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verdigirl
Guest
I am thankful that I don’t know ANY priest who has turned in undocumented individuals to the authorities. Praise God!
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catharina
Guest
It’s good to know that you realize that.
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childofmary1143
Guest
No you wouldn’t, but in my hypothetical scenario, visiting the country isn’t the same to “smuggled a pregnant girlfriend”, even if someone were to try that in the U.S., it isn’t them that is granting citizenship to its baby, its the law of the U.S. Nobody put a gun to the U.S. government’s head to pass that law.
I can’t speak for the U.S. state laws but I do know in Canada that it is illegal to picket or counsel outside an abortion facility.
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Trader
Guest
Thanks for your answers. It looks like I will be remaining in the US.
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fnr
Guest
Again, not the real point of the original post.
I think it’s impossible to set absolutes here. I’ll render unto Caesar what’s Caesar’s, but also keep in mind that Christ didn’t mean do it at all costs. In context, Christ was stripping moral power from the legal authorities of the time, by differentiating what was God’s. I don’t think that implies a transferral of moral authority to the government, but the opposite.
*Matthew 22:
12 Show me the coin that pays the census tax." Then they handed him the Roman coin. He said to them, “Whose image is this and whose inscription?” They replied, “Caesar’s.” 13 At that he said to them, “Then repay to Caesar what belongs to Caesar and to God what belongs to God.”
*
What is the currency of immigration, and whose image is upon it? If we say that it’s Washington, Jackson, or Franklin, we’ve reduced humanity to fungible quantities. But people are created in the image and likeness of God, so that defines the image.
Jesus violated the Jewish law, which was the temporal law in the Jewish-run tetrachic “temple states”, when he overturned the tables in the temples. He clearly didn’t see the need to facilitate that transfer, which was strictly legal.
You certainly can argue that, but I really question whether the omission of one’s identity from civil authorities constitutes deceit if those authorities do not solicit it. I would suggest that the principle of double effect could well apply here.
Citing the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy:
*"The New Catholic Encyclopedia provides four conditions for the application of the principle of double effect:
- The act itself must be morally good or at least indifferent.
- The agent may not positively will the bad effect but may permit it. If he could attain the good effect without the bad effect he should do so. The bad effect is sometimes said to be indirectly voluntary.
- The good effect must flow from the action at least as immediately (in the order of causality, though not necessarily in the order of time) as the bad effect. In other words the good effect must be produced directly by the action, not by the bad effect. Otherwise the agent would be using a bad means to a good end, which is never allowed.
- The good effect must be sufficiently desirable to compensate for the allowing of the bad effect” (p. 1021)."*
No, I certainly can’t, and I actually agree that the government needs to take action to address illegal immigration. However, I don’t think the same considerations apply to a government (legality, national interest) as apply to a potential illegal immigrant (ethics).
And lastly, I think The Grapes of Wrath provides an excellent analogy to today. The misdeeds on the part of farm owners in that novel that led the Joads in that novel to experience a life of misery in California are the same actions that some employers are practicing today.
I would say it to be more of a moral problem for employers willing to pay illegal immigrants wages below the prevailing level (requires a misrepresentation of financial records), expose workers to hazardous conditions without compensation (misrepresent risk, failure to compensate for potential death), and omit workers from the Worker’s Compensation system all constitute immoral behavior, with a motivation of profit.
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Ender
Guest
I doubt that anyone would argue this point but the fact that one group (employers) is violating the law and behaving immorally doesn’t excuse another group’s (illegal immigrants) actions in violating the law and exploiting the illegal and immoral behavior of their employers. Both are illegal and both are immoral.
Ender
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verdigirl
Guest
We keep regressing here. It’s already been discussed that it’s not necessarily a sin to immigrate illegally because of the issues of justice and self-preservation, so I’m not so sure about the immoral part.
From the Catechism:
2241 The more prosperous nations are obliged, to the extent they are able, to welcome the foreigner in search of the security and the means of livelihood which he cannot find in his country of origin. Public authorities should see to it that the natural right is respected that places a guest under the protection of those who receive him.
in essence, undocumented workers are our guests because as a society we’ve been allowing corrupt employers to run rampant
Political authorities, for the sake of the common good for which they are responsible, may make the exercise of the right to immigrate subject to various juridical conditions, especially with regard to the immigrants’ duties toward their country of adoption. Immigrants are obliged to respect with gratitude the material and spiritual heritage of the country that receives them, to obey its laws and to assist in carrying civic burdens.
No one here is advocating a complete disregard of the laws. It’s just that some of us here want to change them so that they’re more fair across the board.
2242 The citizen is obliged in conscience not to follow the directives of civil authorities when they are contrary to the demands of the moral order, to the fundamental rights of persons or the teachings of the Gospel. Refusing obedience to civil authorities, when their demands are contrary to those of an upright conscience, finds its justification in the distinction between serving God and serving the political community. "Render therefore to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s."48 “We must obey God rather than men”:49
According to some of the people contributing to this thread, letting people starve, die in the desert or be exploited by corrupt business owners is immoral, considering that as a society we have turned a blind eye to this situation. Therefore, you can expect me (and others) to go to jail to protect a family in need. Catholic first, American second.
When citizens are under the oppression of a public authority which oversteps its competence, they should still not refuse to give or to do what is objectively demanded of them by the common good; but it is legitimate for them to defend their own rights and those of their fellow citizens against the abuse of this authority within the limits of the natural law and the Law of the Gospel.50
I sure hope you bail me out, Ender!
There is this other issue as well. It’s the issue of keeping families together. Again from the Catechism:
2208 The family should live in such a way that its members learn to care and take responsibility for the young, the old, the sick, the handicapped, and the poor. There are many families who are at times incapable of providing this help. It devolves then on other persons, other families, and, in a subsidiary way, society to provide for their needs: "Religion that is pure and undefiled before God and the Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their affliction and to keep oneself unstained from the world."12
2209 The family must be helped and defended by appropriate social measures. Where families cannot fulfill their responsibilities, other social bodies have the duty of helping them and of supporting the institution of the family. Following the principle of subsidiarity, larger communities should take care not to usurp the family’s prerogatives or interfere in its life.
I think that deporting a family member and leaving children to fend for themselves is a direct intereference in a family’s life. We as the larger Catholic Christian society have a duty of “supporting the institution of the family.”
The best way for us to do that is to fairly provide a path to legalization (whatever that may be) for the people already here, to synchronize our systems so that we can verify legal status in all sectors of society, and properly reinforce our immigration system to correctly and ethically do it’s job. It’s possible for us to have our cake AND eat it too, folks.
But I’m scratching my head at all this resistance to find a balanced solution, as well as the outright scoffing at the Bishops. I gotta tell you that it smacks of racism, and I will leave that to your own consciences to deal with.
As we say in the ghetto, “Check yourself before you wreck yourself.”
Peace, out!
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fnr
Guest
Again, I think the double effect applies in the case of the workers, who seek “good” involving relieving the immiserated conditions of families in the developing world. I think it difficult to argue that profit constitutes the same type of “good” that the principle of double effect considers.
Just one example of how workers are often acting in desperation is the number of deaths that occur crossing the border at inhospitable locations. Who really is willing to risk one’s own life for something that’s not important?
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Ender
Guest
You are very comfortable calling employees who employ illegals (at least those who hire off the books) corrupt - and I neither disapprove nor disagree. So what about those who facilitate and profit from that corruption? Are they not corrupt as well?
There are two reasons why you really don’t want to go with this argument: it is both vicious as well as vacuous. I would like to assume the vicious part is enough to discourage its use, but if not you should at least recognize that the issue to be determined is whether my comments are correct or incorrect, not whether I am a nice person. Suppose I were an unrepentant racist - does that make all of my arguments wrong or does the correctness of my statements depend more on the facts I present and the logic of my arguments than on the state of my soul?
Ender
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verdigirl
Guest
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verdigirl
Guest
Here’s how “unimportant” this issue is for some of these people:
They Die in Brooks County
I forewarn you that this is graphic.
You think this is about something as frivolous as simple profit?
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