(RNS) — Shortly before checking himself in to Rome’s Gemelli hospital in mid-February, Pope Francis issued an unusual — and unusually blistering — open letter to the American Catholic bishops, calling the Trump administration’s plan to deport millions of immigrants from the U.S. “a major crisis” and urging Catholics to stand for human dignity, having earlier called it “a disgrace.”
As President Donald Trump’s first 100 days in office have been marked by a barrage of anti-immigrant rhetoric, cancellation of refugee programs and detentions of even immigrants with legal status, the U.S. bishops have issued their own letters in protest and sued to reinstate federal funding to resettle immigrants. But after losing the suit on appeal, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops decided in early April to end its decades-long collaboration with the government, while asking for prayers “that we might still find generous ways to respond to crises.”
Some Catholic observers believe the church has been too meek. Michael Lee, director of Fordham University’s Center for American Catholic Studies, said in an interview, “I find it striking that we’ve had a politics that has called itself pro-life for so long that seems to be turning its back on what is clearly the defense of human lives,” said Lee.
The National Catholic Reporter’s Michael Sean Winters, recalling the bishops’ …