CNA\/EWTN News<\/a>).- Addressing America's immigration problem, Archbishop Jos\u00e9 Gomez of Los Angeles urged religious believers to recall the nation to an understanding of human dignity based on its biblical roots.<\/p>\n\t\u201cThe real problem is that immigration is a question about America \u2013 about our national identity and destiny, about the national 'soul,'\u201d the Archbishop of Los Angeles told the Jewish advocacy group AJC's event \u201cBonds of Fellowship and Friendship\u201d March 19.<\/p>\n
\t\u201cThe question for us is what\u2019s our role in immigration reform, as religious people? \u2026 I think our role is to be the voice of conscience and vision. That\u2019s what\u2019s been missing in the debate so far.\u201d<\/p>\n
\tDuring his remarks, the archbishop said that he himself is an immigrant \u2013 a native of Monterrey, Mexico who did not move to the U.S. until after his college education.<\/p>\n
\tArchbishop Gomez noted that the evening was an opportunity to deepen friendship between Catholics and Jews in Los Angeles, \u201cdeepening the spiritual ties that unite us in truth, respect and goodness.\u201d<\/p>\n
\tHe said that the communities' joint mission is to make their city a place of love, truth and peace, and that immigration reform is among the most pressing issues faced by Los Angeles.<\/p>\n
\tThe archbishop expressed gladness that \u201cfinally\u201d there is movement on the issue, noting that at a meeting with religious leaders a couple weeks ago, President Obama \u201cagreed with our concerns\u201d on immigration.<\/p>\n
\tImmigration poses questions about America's identity, he said.<\/p>\n
\t\u201cWhat does it mean to be an American? Who are we as a people and where are we heading as a country? What will the \u201cnext America\u201d look like? What should the next America look like?\u201d<\/p>\n
\tArchbishop Gomez noted G. K. Chesterton's comment that the U.S. is the only nation founded not on a territory or shared race or ethnicity, but on a creed, on a vision.<\/p>\n
\tThe vision, he said, is Judeo-Christian, rooted in both the Old and New Testaments.<\/p>\n
\t\u201cAmerica\u2019s 'creed' is based on the biblical teaching that human life is sacred and has great dignity \u2014 because God made men and women in his own image. It gets expressed this way in the Declaration of Independence.\u201d<\/p>\n
\tThis belief has allowed a \u201cflourishing diversity of cultures, religions and ways of life,\u201d but increasing secularism, he said, \u201cmakes it hard to talk about the values and commitments we find in America\u2019s founding documents.\u201d<\/p>\n
\tAmerica's founding principles \u2013 that human rights come not from government but from God \u2013 is what makes it even possible to talk about human rights and dignity, said Archbishop Gomez.<\/p>\n
\t\u201cSo if we are not allowed to talk about God anymore in our politics or civic life then it becomes very hard to talk about human rights and human dignity.\u201d<\/p>\n
\t\u201cAnd I think that\u2019s one of the problems we are having in this immigration debate. We have lost sense of the 'humanity' of the men and women and children who are living in this country illegally.\u201d<\/p>\n
\tHe expressed concern that we are \u201closing something of our national soul\u201d in how illegal immigration is addressed.<\/p>\n
\t\u201cThis great nation finds itself today reduced to addressing this major issue in our public life through: name calling and discrimination; criminal 'profiling' based on race; random identity checks; violent raids of workplaces and homes; arbitrary detentions and deportations.\u201d<\/p>\n
\tA quarter of persons deported from the U.S. are from intact families, he said. \u201cIn the name of enforcing our laws, now we are breaking up families.\u201d<\/p>\n
\tLast year, 400,000 persons were deported, the archbishop noted. That means that last year, 100,000 families were rent apart in the name of American law.<\/p>\n
\t\u201cThese are not statistics, these are souls. Human beings. We\u2019re talking about fathers and husbands who, with no warning, won\u2019t be coming home for dinner tonight \u2013 and who may not see their families again for a decade at least. We are talking about a government policy that punishes children for the crimes of their parents.\u201d<\/p>\n
\tArchbishop Gomez called the nation to be \u201ca better people than this.\u201d He said America must be a place of both justice and law, as well as compassion and common sense.<\/p>\n
\t\u201cWhat we\u2019re doing right now betrays our values and makes our country weaker and more vulnerable.\u201d<\/p>\n
\tJews and Christians are called to be mindful of the strangers among us \u201cfor you were strangers in the land of Egypt,\u201d God told the Hebrews in Exodus.<\/p>\n
\tArchbishop Gomez said that is \u201cwhat our society needs to hear right now\u2026We need to help our brothers and sisters to remember the founding vision of America. The vision of the Bible.\u201d<\/p>\n
\tHe said Jews and Christians must communicate this vision, in which the human person is made in the image of God. We must be \u201cthe people who remember and believe \u2013 that in God\u2019s eyes we\u2019re all his beloved sons and daughters.\u201d<\/p>\n
\tEven though in \u201cour agitated political climate\u201d this sounds \u201cna\u00efve,\u201d he said this is \u201cno time for polite silence about our values. Too much is at stake to give in to the corrosive cynicism that masks itself as political 'realism.'\u201d<\/p>\n
\t\u201cWe need to remind our neighbors,\u201d Archbishop Gomez concluded, that America was was founded on the vision \u201cthat nobody ever forfeits his humanity or his right to be treated with dignity. No matter where he comes from or how he got here.\u201d<\/p>\n
\t\u201cNo matter what kind of papers he possesses or doesn\u2019t possess. This is as fundamental to the Bill of Rights as it is and the Torah or the Sermon on the Mount.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n
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