Is the Vatican or Council of Bishops open to an alternative?

[Glutted]

They have explicitly stated that there should be a “free trade” on immigration. But they also want to solve poverty.

Immigrating everyone to the US would create problems; environmental nightmaires, violence from crowding, food shortages, you name it.

My question is, have they realized that taking away the reasons people need to immigrate (poverty) is better than stressing the admission of extra bodies into wealthy countries? Nations have a fundamental right to choose whether to let extra bodies come into their country or not.

 

[Della]

No they have not considered such things because they are not social engineers nor do they consult social engineers. They only see people in need and think the way out is to get them to America, as if we don’t have a poverty problem already, and as if we have unlimited resources to care for all the world’s poor.

 

[Dale_M]

Glutted and Della, have you read any of the documents released by the US Conference of Catholic Bishops about this subject?

The Catholic Catechism teaches that in the realm of immigration law all governments have two essential duties, both of which must be carried out and neither of which can be ignored.

The first duty is to welcome the foreigner out of charity and respect for the dignity and rights of the human person. Persons have the right to immigrate and thus government must accommodate this right to the greatest extent possible, consistent with its other obligations to the common good. The right to immigrate is a therefore a qualified, rather than an absolute right. Nevertheless, all nations and especially financially blessed nations are called to make every possible effort to assist persons who are compelled by their circumstances to migrate.

The second duty of government is to secure its border and enforce immigration law for the sake of the common good, including the safety and well-being of the nation’s inhabitants and the rule of law. Sovereign nations thus have the right and the responsibility to enforce immigration laws and all persons must respect and obey the legitimate exercise of this authority. For their part, immigrants are called to obey the law and carry out their civic duties in furtherance of the common good. 2

The United States Catholic Bishops Conference (USCCB) believes that meaningful immigration reform must properly balance the right to migrate and the right to regulate migration. Thus, the USCCB opposes “enforcement only” immigration policies because they lack proper accommodation of the right to migrate. Instead, the USCCB supports “comprehensive” immigration policies that pare valid enforcement laws with fair and generous legalization measures. The U.S. Catholic Bishops have outlined various elements of their proposal for comprehensive immigration reform. The key elements of comprehensive reform advocated by the Bishops are…

(The position paper then spells out the elements of comprehensive immigration reform)
usccb.org/mrs/legal.shtml

Since this forum is about recent news, and since we are to include a link to a news article, how about:
U.S. bishops to hold national migration conference?

 

[Glutted]

At least it had something on addressing root causes.

 

[Della]

And if only all the bishops actually operated under this understanding, but not all do. It gives people false hope to think that all they have to do is make it to America and all will be well. Those who encourage such false hope don’t seem to understand that.

 

[NewUlm1976_2000]

They have explicitly stated that there should be a “free trade” on immigration. But they also want to solve poverty.

Immigrating everyone to the US would create problems; environmental nightmaires, violence from crowding, food shortages, you name it.

My question is, have they realized that taking away the reasons people need to immigrate (poverty) is better than stressing the admission of extra bodies into wealthy countries? Nations have a fundamental right to choose whether to let extra bodies come into their country or not.

Like Dale posted, the USCCB speaks about each person first. This relates to safe border passage (without injury or death), and encourages legal crossings of borders.

The US is not alone in the current worldwide economy. Australia deals with immigrants from all over the south Pacific (Thai, Phillipeans), Europe deals with north Africa immigrants, etc… When you hear the news stories they are all the same, just replace the country they are going to and coming from.

That does not mean we abandon third world countries, but there needs to be a balance so people in all countries are treated with respect and are able to make a living.

 

[RWMorris]

They have explicitly stated that there should be a “free trade” on immigration…

Economists have long believed that the world economy will operate at peak efficiency, with maximum benefit for the most people, only when there is a free flow of capital, goods, and labor. We are rapidly moving in that direction with capital and goods, but we are a long way from that goal with labor. We have a lot of issues to solve before we get there.

 

[Ender]

My question is, have they realized that taking away the reasons people need to immigrate (poverty) is better than stressing the admission of extra bodies into wealthy countries? Nations have a fundamental right to choose whether to let extra bodies come into their country or not.

Well, the good news is that their political suggestions impose no moral obligations on us to assent to them. We are as free to accept or reject them as if they emanated from one of the political parties.

Ender