The bishop of San Bernardino has formally suspended the Sunday mass obligation throughout his diocese due to ICE attempts to arrest worshippers. The Diocese of Nashville issued a statement in response to ICE raids reminding the faithful that they are not obligated to attend Sunday mass if they are fearful for their well-being.
ICE has arrested worshippers who were attending services in a number of denominations. I wrote about ICE arrests of Iranian Christians who were seeking asylum in this country because of being persecuted for their Christian faith in Iran. ICE threatened the arrest the pastor, who is an American citizen who had fled Iran after being imprisoned there for his faith in Christ.
I’ve watched videos of ICE arresting worshippers at a number of churches. In each of them, ICE threatened the church’s pastor with arrest for attempting to stand up for their church members. ICE has also arrested a number of people at Catholic churches.
Trump’s big beautiful bill that passed last week adds $150 billion to ICE’s budget. That will make ice the largest police force in the world. ICE will be bigger than the militaries of most nations.
I am guessing that this means that if you haven’t seen large numbers of masked, fully armed soldiers grabbing people off the streets and out of the churches in your city and hauling them off to hell-hole prisons without being charged with a crime, or having the benefit of a trial, you will see it soon.
I would add that if you think this is going to stop with hispanics, you are dreaming. Before this is over, it’s going to be anybody, anytime.
Here is the Bishop Rojas’ letter suspending the Sunday mass obligation throughout his diocese. This is an extraordinary document for an extraordinary time; the Catholic Church authorizing parishioners to indefinitely skip Mass out of fear that they will be detained and deported on their way to worship.
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