Pope Francis' Sermon for the World Day of Migrants and Refugees

Pope Francis

Pope Francis spoke today from St. Peter's Basilica on a theme that lies close to my own feelings, as he sought to relieve the plight of migrants and refugees. This message resonates shortly after United States President Donald Trump, who ran on an America First theme and who repeatedly compared refugees to poisonous snakes, spoke profanely against Africa and Haiti. Giving his sermon on the World Day of Migrants and Refugees, Francis quoted the Bible and called it a "sin" to turn away refugees because of our fears. He admitted that it is easy and understandable to fear people who differ from us. "These fears," he explained, "are legitimate, based on doubts that are fully comprehensible from a human points of view. Having doubts and fears is not a sin." (In Catholic teaching, a sin is an act that separates people from God.)

He continued, however, that "The sin is to allow these fears to determine our responses, to limit our choices, to compromise respect and generosity, to feed hostility and rejection." Instead, he said, that the chance to "encounter the different, to encounter the neighbor" was "in fact a privileged opportunity to encounter the Lord."

He established his point, first, by citing Matthew 25 ("I was a stranger and you did not invite me in") and by continuing: "Every stranger who knocks on our door is an opportunity to meet Jesus Christ, who identifies himself with the foreigner who has been accepted or rejected in every age." Francis protested that "We often refuse to encounter the other and raise barriers to defend ourselves." 

Although this sermon seemed like a perfectly timed response to President Trump's recent unfortunate comments about other countries, it was, in fact, prepared well in advance, and a preliminary text was released last August. More generally, the Pope's message represented his  continuing effort to stand up for migrants and to put Christian morality about migrants and refugees back on a biblical basis. How important is that? A huge majority of White Evangelical voters supported Donald Trump in 2016, despite, or maybe, horrifyingly, because of, his opposition to refugees.

Yet, there is, in my opinion, no subject on topic on which the Bible is clearer than the command to show mercy to immigrants. Jesus of Nazareth was himself a refugee from political persecution (Matthew 2:13-15), and the Bible does not say anything about his family doing the proper legal paperwork before they fled. The Pope's prepared text gave his thematic verse from Leviticus 19:34: "You shall treat the stranger who sojourns with you as the native among you, and you shall love him as yourself, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt: I am the Lord your God." It takes much courage for a speaker to advocate what is right, against what is popular. Anti-immigrant, anti-refugee voices have become loud, and often very nasty. Indeed, with anti-refugee, anti-immigrant voices forcing too many Western nations to turn away from the world and into themselves, the Pope provided much-needed moral correction. 

Is the flock listening?