On Saturday, Denver Archbishop Samuel Aquila blamed both parties for failing “horribly when it comes to immigration,” distancing himself from his fellow bishops — and from Pope Leo — who’ve been focusing blame for the current immigration crisis on Trump’s policies.
Earlier this month, U.S. Catholic bishops — including Aquila himself — released a “Special Message” blasting multiple Trump immigration policies, without naming the president.
Leading a prayer vigil in front of an ICE facility in Aurora that’s been cited for inhuman treatment and unjust detention of immigrants, Aquila made no mention of the jail looming behind him — despite last week’s statement by U.S. bishops that specifically cited concern about the “condition inside detention centers and the lack of access to pastoral care.”
In his remarks, posted on Denver Catholic, Aquila said nothing about the “climate of fear and anxiety around questions of profiling and immigration enforcement,” cited in the bishops’ letter, which Aquila signed along with nearly all other U.S. bishops. Aquila said nothing about the bishops’ letter’s “lament” that “some immigrants in the United States have arbitrarily lost their legal status” or the letter’s expression of sadness over the “state of contemporary debate and the vilification of immigrants.”
Instead, Aquila took a historical perspective, slamming both parties without pointing to Trump or his policies specifically for exacerbating the current immigration chaos.
“Both political parties have failed horribly when it comes to immigration,” Aquila told the parishioners after the Stations of the Cross procession. “They have treated immigrants as pawns for their own elections, for their own desires, and they have failed every immigrant.
“Both political parties. Not just one, but both. And they have not served people well. Their only interest is themselves and that alone. And getting to the next election.”
Aquila called on both parties to pass the Dignity Act, a proposed law, with bipartisan support, that would offer a path to citizenship for some immigrants who’ve lived many years in the United States. The legislation has almost no chance of passing Congress.
When asked if Trump would support the bill, his spokeswoman did not answer directly but stated that “the president has made it very clear he will not support amnesty for illegal aliens in any way.”
U.S. Bishops released an unusual “Special Message” on immigration expressing concern about specific harms that immigrants face now due to the policies of Trump.
“We are disturbed when we see among our people a climate of fear and anxiety around questions of profiling and immigration enforcement, wrote U.S. bishops in their Special Message. “We are saddened by the state of contemporary debate and the vilification of immigrants. We are concerned about the conditions in detention centers and the lack of access to pastoral care. We lament that some immigrants in the United States have arbitrarily lost their legal status. We are troubled by threats against the sanctity of houses of worship and the special nature of hospitals and schools. We are grieved when we meet parents who fear being detained when taking their children to school and when we try to console family members who have already been separated from their loved ones.”
In response, Trump Border Czar Tim Holman said the bishops were “wrong.”
“I’m a lifelong Catholic, but I’m saying it not only as a border czar, but I’m also saying this as a Catholic, I think they need to spend time fixing the Catholic Church,” he said, as quoted in the National Catholic Reporter.
Saturday’s vigil in front of the Aurora ICE facility was his first documented public prayer vigil that was not focused on banning abortion.
In January. Aquila joined other Colorado bishops in stating that “no country has the duty to receive so many immigrants that its social and economic life is jeopardized” and criticizing “open border” policies that previously “restricted Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s ability to investigate, arrest, or deport spies, terrorists, and felons.”
In remarks prior to Saturday’s procession, Colorado Bishop Rodríguez referenced deportation and other policies in a negative manner.
