The Catholic bishop of San Bernardino County, California, informed congregants Tuesday they’re launched from the duty to attend Sunday providers if they’ve a “real worry of immigration enforcement actions” whereas attending Mass, marking the most recent occasion of the Catholic Church repudiating the Trump administration.
The decree from Bishop Alberto Rojas, who spoke out in opposition to President Donald Trump’s brutal immigration raids final month, mentioned the county’s parishioners could skip Mass with out worry of that impeding on their “non secular good.”
“In issuing this decree, I’m guided by the Church’s mission to look after the non secular welfare of all entrusted to my care, significantly those that face worry or hardship,” Rojas wrote in his announcement.
His choice comes weeks after Catholic officers in San Bernardino County mentioned Immigration and Customs Enforcement brokers entered two parish properties within the county and detained a number of folks.
Following the incident, Rojas issued a letter, saying, “Authorities are actually seizing brothers and sisters indiscriminately, with out respect for his or her proper to due course of and their dignity as youngsters of God.” He pleaded with the Trump administration to “rethink and stop these ways instantly” and as a substitute discover “an method that respects human rights and human dignity.”
San Bernardino County is the sixth-largest Catholic diocese in the USA, according to Vatican News.
Rojas’ announcement comes after the primary bishop appointed by the newly chosen Pope Leo XIV urged members of the clergy to help migrants by exhibiting as much as immigration courtroom proceedings.
The Rev. Michael Pham ― a refugee from Vietnam whom Leo appointed as bishop of San Diego, California ― made the suggestion in a letter to religion leaders final month, writing: “We all know that migrants and refugees discover themselves within the troublesome predicament of being known as to seem, which is what the federal government asks of them, after which being given orders for expedited elimination from our nation.”
In one in all his first addresses, Leo ― the primary U.S.-born pope ― signaled some opposition to Trump’s immigration insurance policies.
“My very own story is that of a citizen, the descendant of immigrants, who in flip selected to to migrate,” he informed ambassadors on the Vatican in Could.
“All of us, in the midst of our lives, can discover ourselves wholesome or sick, employed or unemployed, dwelling in our place of birth or out of the country, but our dignity at all times stays unchanged. It’s the dignity of a creature willed and liked by God,” he continued.
And final week, Cardinal Robert McElroy, whose archdiocese consists of Washington, D.C., slammed Trump’s immigration raids as “inhumane” and “morally repugnant.”
“That is merely an effort to attempt to deliver a way of terror to those that are undocumented,” he told CNN.
