But Alt! The Church says nations have a right to control borders!

f course they do. And inter­locu­tors have the duty to avoid log­i­cal fal­lac­i­es like straw men; I know Church teach­ing on this point and have not denied it. Show me where if you think I lie. The USCCB has a good overview of Catholic social teach­ing on this top­ic. It cites three “basic prin­ci­ples,” and here are the first two:

• Peo­ple have the right to migrate to sus­tain their lives and the lives of their fam­i­lies.
• A coun­try has the right to reg­u­late its bor­ders and to con­trol immi­gra­tion.

There it is. So let’s look at some more detail on this sec­ond one. The USCCB says that a nation may restrict immi­gra­tion “for the com­mon good”:

Catholic social teach­ing is real­is­tic: While peo­ple have the right to move, no coun­try has the duty to receive so many immi­grants that its social and eco­nom­ic life are jeop­ar­dized.

That’s true, and it’s a fear many have. At the same time, many politi­cians exploit this fear against a par­tic­u­lar dis­fa­vored group—such as, at one time, Catholics. How much of this sounds famil­iar?

Native-born Protes­tants, most­ly in urban areas, felt threat­ened by the new arrivals in sev­er­al areas. To many Protes­tants, the Catholic Church rep­re­sent­ed tyran­ny and poten­tial sub­ju­ga­tion to a for­eign pow­er. On a prac­ti­cal lev­el, com­pe­ti­tion for jobs increased as new labor­ers arrived. As anti-immi­grant and anti–Roman Catholic feel­ings arose, nativist groups began to form in cities across the Unit­ed States. Many of these orga­ni­za­tions played on fears that for­eign­ers were gain­ing undue polit­i­cal influ­ence because of the efforts of unscrupu­lous politi­cians to woo them and ‘steal’ elec­tions. Nativists often played on stereo­types depict­ing Irish and Ger­mans as immoral drunk­ards and often blamed them for social ills, such as ris­ing crime and pover­ty rates.

It’s an easy way for big­otry and racism to start. That’s what nativism is. One must be care­ful. This sec­ond “basic prin­ci­ple” is not a veto of the first. The Church defines infal­li­bil­i­ty, but not so as to give Catholics per­mis­sion to dis­re­gard the rest of Church teach­ing. In a like way, the Church says nations may con­trol their bor­ders, but not as a veto on the duty to wel­come the stranger.

For there is a third prin­ci­ple, and it is this: “A coun­try must reg­u­late its bor­ders with jus­tice and mer­cy.” The USCCB explains:

• A nation may not sim­ply decide that it wants to pro­vide for its own peo­ple and no oth­ers. A sin­cere com­mit­ment to the needs of all must pre­vail.
• Under the harsh­est view, undoc­u­ment­ed peo­ple may be regard­ed as unde­serv­ing of rights or ser­vices. This is not the view of Catholic social teach­ing. The Catholic Church teach­es that every per­son has basic human rights and is enti­tled to have basic human needs met—food, shel­ter, cloth­ing, edu­ca­tion, and health care.
• Cur­rent immi­gra­tion pol­i­cy that crim­i­nal­izes the mere attempt to immi­grate and impris­ons immi­grants who have com­mit­ted no crime or who have already served a just sen­tence for a crime is immoral. In the Bible, God promis­es that our judg­ment will be based on our treat­ment of the most vul­ner­a­ble. Before God we can­not excuse inhu­mane treat­ment of cer­tain per­sons by claim­ing that their lack of legal sta­tus deprives them of rights giv­en by the Cre­ator.
• Immi­gra­tion pol­i­cy that allows peo­ple to live here and con­tribute to soci­ety for years but refus­es to offer them the oppor­tu­ni­ty to achieve legal sta­tus does not serve the com­mon good. The pres­ence of mil­lions of peo­ple liv­ing with­out easy access to basic human rights and neces­si­ties is a great injus­tice.
• It is the posi­tion of the Catholic Church that pas­toral, edu­ca­tion­al, med­ical, and social ser­vices pro­vid­ed by the Church are nev­er con­di­tioned on legal sta­tus. All per­sons are invit­ed to par­tic­i­pate in our parish­es, attend our schools, and receive oth­er ser­vices offered by our insti­tu­tions and pro­grams.

So let us review some of what’s been hap­pen­ing.

• Chil­dren, even as young as four months, are being sep­a­rat­ed from ther par­ents.
• They are being denied basic needs like soap and beds and tooth­brush­es and clean clothes.
• They are not per­mit­ted the oppor­tu­ni­ty to bathe.
• For days and weeks they are kept in stand­ing-room only con­di­tions.
• They are being denied ade­quate med­ical care. One woman was cov­ered in her own breast milk. Anoth­er was wear­ing clothes cov­ered in snot. And some, lack­ing dia­pers, piss and shit in their pants.

These hor­ror sto­ries go on and on, and the news arti­cles about them this past week have gone on and on. Here is one. Here is anoth­er. And here is a third.

And accord­ing to this arti­cle, the Jus­tice Depart­ment argued in court that migrant chil­dren don’t need such lux­u­ries as tooth­brush­es or soap. The judge was incred­u­lous:

Are you argu­ing seri­ous­ly that you do not read the agree­ment as requir­ing you to do any­thing oth­er than what I just described: cold all night long, lights on all night long, sleep­ing on con­crete and you’ve got an alu­minum foil blan­ket? I find that incon­ceiv­able that the gov­ern­ment would say that that is safe and san­i­tary.

What­ev­er else you call that, it is not treat­ing migrants, includ­ing very young chil­dren, with either jus­tice or mer­cy. It’s treat­ing them like you think they are ani­mals and not peo­ple. And yes, it’s putting them in con­cen­tra­tion camps. And it is not pro-life.

So yes. If you’re inter­est­ed, I’ll cite the entire Church teach­ing on immi­gra­tion:

In the Bible, God promis­es that our judg­ment will be based on our treat­ment of the most vul­ner­a­ble. Before God we can­not excuse inhu­mane treat­ment of cer­tain per­sons by claim­ing that their lack of legal sta­tus deprives them of rights giv­en by the Cre­ator.

That is what many have done and will con­tin­ue to do. But on that day, he will say to those on his left, “I was filthy and you did not bathe me. I was sick and you did not treat me. I had no place to lie down and you did not give me a bed. For indeed, what­ev­er you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.” And he will send them to eter­nal pun­ish­ment.