VATICAN CITY (CNS) – Pope Francis called the migration crisis between Mexico and the United States a “serious problem” and praised a U.S. bishop working along the border during an interview with Telemundo journalist Julio Vaqueiro.

In the interview, broadcast May 25, the pope was shown photos of a baby wrapped in a blanket and placed inside a suitcase to be taken across the Rio Grande into the United States.

Pope Francis waves at a participant during a meeting of Scholas Occurentes, an educational initiative, held at the Augustinianum Institute for Patristic Studies in Rome May 25, 2023. Julian Vaqueiro, a Telemundo journalist seen in front holding a microphone, was the event’s master of ceremonies, and spoke with Pope Francis in an interview released May 25. (CNS photo/Lola Gomez)

“It’s a serious problem there,” the pope said in response. “On the other side (of the border) there is a great man, Bishop Seitz” of El Paso, Texas.

“This bishop feels (the problem),” Pope Francis said. “The problem of migrants is serious, it’s serious there and it’s serious here,” he said about Europe, particularly “along the Libyan coast.”

Speaking about his own experience as a child of immigrants, and now as an immigrant in Rome, the pope said that every person who leaves his or her homeland “misses the air of their birthplace.”

“The mate you make in a thermos yourself is not the same as the mate your mom or your aunt makes for you,” he said, referring to the caffeinated herbal drink popular in Argentina.

Vaqueiro asked Pope Francis about his meeting May 13 with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

The pope said Zelenskyy asked for his help in returning Ukrainian children who have been taken into Russia and told the pope to “not dream much about mediations.”

Since the outbreak of the war, the Vatican has avoided openly condemning the Russian government and has offered itself as a mediator for peace negotiations between Russia and Ukraine.

“Really, Ukraine’s bloc is very strong, it’s all of Europe, the United States, so it has a lot of strength,” Pope Francis said to explain why a Vatican mediation did not appear immediately feasible. “But what really pained (Zelenskyy) and what he asked for collaboration on was trying to get the children back into Ukraine.”

More than 19,000 Ukrainian children have been forcibly deported into Russia or Russian-held territories according to a Ukrainian government website. The U.N. Human Rights Office has classified Russia’s illegal transfer of children into its territories as a war crime.

In response to a question on abortion, Pope Francis said that a fetus is a “living being, I’m not saying a person, but a living being.”

“Is it licit to eliminate a living being to resolve a problem?” he asked. “Is it licit to hire a hitman to resolve a problem?”

On abuse, the pope said that priestly celibacy “has nothing to do” with the sexual abuse of minors by the clergy, since, he said, abuse is committed at high rates within families and schools by married persons too.

Vaqueiro, who served earlier in the evening as master of ceremonies at Pope Francis’ meeting with members of Scholas Occurentes, a Vatican-related educational initiative, asked the pope what still needed to be done to realize the reforms discussed by the cardinals in the lead up to the conclave that elected him pope just over 10 years ago.

“Everything,” Pope Francis said. “It’s curious, as you do things, you realize everything that still needs to be done; it’s something insatiable.”

WASHINGTON (OSV News) – The Biden administration announced April 27 new steps it would take in an effort to reduce migrant arrivals at the U.S.-Mexico border when Title 42 expires in May.

In remarks at the State Department, Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas said the administration would set up migrant processing centers in Latin America to screen those seeking entry as to whether they have a legal pathway.

The administration also will expand legal pathways for entry, while increasing deportations of those who enter the United States unlawfully.

Blinken said the centers would “improve qualified individuals’ access” to refugee resettlement, family reunification and lawful settlement in the U.S. or other countries.

U.S. Secretary of State Anthony Blinken and U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas, pictured with President Joe Biden in a March 1, 2021, file photo. Blinken and Mayorkas made issued a statement April 27, 2023, on steps the Biden administration will take in an effort to reduce migrant arrivals at the U.S.-Mexico border when Title 42 expires May 11. (OSV News photo/Kevin Lamarque, Reuters)

“These centers will take a hugely important step to prevent people from making the dangerous journey to the border by providing a much safer, legal option to migrate that they can pursue in and from their own countries,” Blinken said.

Mayorkas said that “when people have safe and orderly pathways to come to the United States, and face consequences for failing to do so, they use those pathways.”

Title 42 is a part of federal U.S. public health law granting the federal government some authority to implement emergency action to prevent the spread of contagious diseases by barring some individuals from entry.

Then-President Donald Trump implemented the policy in 2020 at the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, but the move was seen as part of his administration’s broader attempts to reduce migration. The use of Title 42 to expel migrants at the southern border was criticized by some public health experts, who argued it was politically motivated rather than evidence-based.

Since then, Title 42 has been invoked more than 2.7 million times to expel migrants, including those seeking asylum, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection data. Title 42 is set to end May 11.

In a statement issued late April 28, Bishop Mark J. Seitz of El Paso, Texas, chairman of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Committee on Migration, said the bishops “strongly support increased refugee resettlement from Latin America and the Caribbean as a reliable pathway to lasting safety for those who have been forcibly displaced.”

He said the bishops “look forward to its close coordination with civil society and Congress to ensure the successful integration of these newcomers.” Bishop Seitz added that resources used for this “should not undermine existing access to resettlement for other refugees or impede the proper functioning of immigration processes generally.”

The bishops “are relieved that the Administration does not plan to detain vulnerable families, given the unjustifiable and immoral harms of doing so,” Bishop Seitz continued, but they also “are greatly concerned that such families, including those with young children, and others will be subjected to rushed proceedings without meaningful due process.”

The administration’s continued “reliance on expedited removal” coupled with “severe restrictions on asylum eligibility and access” is concerning, Bishop Seitz said, adding that those “most desperately in need of relief” will “bear the brunt of these measures.”

He acknowledged the “challenge of forced migration facing our country and hemisphere” is “complex” and said that achieving “the conditions necessary to sustainably reduce irregular migration” will only happen by overhauling the U.S. immigration system and making a long-term commitment to address root causes of migration and promote “integral human development throughout the Americas.”

J. Kevin Appleby, interim executive director of the Center for Migration Studies, told OSV News April 27 that the Biden administration’s announcement seems “a positive step forward.”

“Of course, as always, it depends on how something is implemented and what resources are devoted to the implementation that will decide whether it’s successful or not,” Appleby said.

“But it gives asylum- seekers an opportunity to tell their stories and have their cases adjudicated without taking a dangerous journey north.”

Appleby, a former adviser on migration policy for the U.S. bishops, said that for the last quarter century, “Congress has not had the political courage to reform the immigration system.”

“So it’s left to the executive branch to come up with these responses, when Congress should be working with the administration to pass legislation to overhaul our immigration laws,” he said.

Republicans have made immigration a key part of their criticism of the Biden administration, accusing him of lax policies. In a statement reacting to Biden’s 2024 reelection bid, former President Donald Trump, in the midst of his third bid for the White House after Biden defeated him in 2020, said, “Under Biden, the Southern Border has been abolished — and millions of illegal aliens have been released into our communities.”

A fact sheet from the State Department about the new actions said, “The lifting of the Title 42 order does not mean the border is open.”

The fact sheet said that any individuals who unlawfully cross the U.S. southern border after Title 42 is lifted will be processed for expedited removal, barred from reentry for at least five years if they are ordered removed and would be ineligible for asylum “absent an applicable exception.”

“To avoid these consequences, individuals are encouraged to use the many lawful pathways the United States has expanded over the past two years,” the fact sheet said.

The U.S. bishops and other Catholic immigration advocates have criticized Title 42 as well as the Biden administration’s continued use of the Trump-era policy.

WASHINGTON (CNS) – In an end-of-the year decision, the Supreme Court said Dec. 27 that a federal public health rule that allows immigration officials at the border to quickly turn away migrants seeking asylum could stay in place while legal challenges to the policy played out.

A view of the Paso del Norte International Bridge crossing between Mexico and the U.S. is seen as Venezuelan migrants stand in Ciudad Juárez, Mexico, on the edge of the Rio Grande Dec. 27, 2022. (CNS photo/Jose Luis Gonzalez, Reuters)

In a 5-4 decision, the justices stopped a trial judge’s ruling that would have lifted the measure, known as Title 42 of the Public Health Services Act, on Dec. 21.

Chief Justice John Roberts had already put that order on pause Dec. 19 responding to an emergency request filed by 19 states asking the justices to keep Title 42 in place.

The Trump administration used the public health measure during the pandemic to allow U.S. border officials to expel migrants quickly without giving them an opportunity to seek asylum in the United States.

“Our hearts (are) broken by this decision and the many people that will be further harmed because of it,” tweeted the Interfaith Immigration Coalition Dec. 27.

They said that as people of faith, they were calling on President Joe Biden to “do everything in his power to welcome people seeking safety with the compassion they deserve.”

The justices agreed to hear arguments about enforcement of Title 42 at the border in February. In their brief unsigned order, they said the rule will remain in place for now and they will only consider whether the states challenging it have the legal right to do so.

In a dissent, Justice Neil Gorsuch, joined by Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, emphasized that the Biden administration and Congress have failed to adequately address the immigration crisis and also said the nation’s high court is not meant to issue policies.

He said he did not discount concerns raised by the state attorneys general and also acknowledged that lifting Title 42 “will likely have disruptive consequences,” but he said the reason it was enforced, as a public health measure, is no longer valid.

“The current border crisis is not a COVID crisis,” he wrote, adding that the courts “should not be in the business of perpetuating administrative edicts designed for one emergency only because elected officials have failed to address a different emergency. We are a court of law, not policymakers of last resort.”

Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan indicated they would have allowed the federal judge’s ruling ending Title 42 to stand, but they did not join the dissent.

Title 42 gives the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention the power to bar the entry of individuals into the United States to protect the public from contagious diseases.

The Biden administration initially extended the policy used by the Trump administration but in April it announced that it would end it, saying it was no longer necessary to protect public health.

A federal judge in Louisiana said the administration had not followed proper procedures in trying end Title 42 and ordered that it stay in place. The administration has appealed that decision to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit, where it remains pending.

In a separate case, a federal judge in Washington ruled that the policy itself was illegal and ordered the government to end it, which was challenged by 19 states with Republican attorneys general.

After the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit rejected the states’ request to join the case, the states came to the Supreme Court urging the court to keep the policy in place and saying that lifting it would “cause a crisis of unprecedented proportions at the border.”

Migrant families challenging the policy say the states’ support for Title 42 is not based on pandemic concerns. They also said the policy has had a devastating impact on those forced to return to “cartels and others ready to abduct and exploit them.”

Migrant advocates, including Catholic church organizations, women religious and Bishop Mark J. Seitz of El Paso, Texas, chairman of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ migration committee, have strongly supported ending Title 42.

Texas border cities, like El Paso, had been preparing for the surge of new migrants as the pandemic-era rule was scheduled to end.

In mid-December, Dylan Corbett, director of the Hope Border Institute, a Catholic organization helping migrants, said constant changing policies make it hard for organizations such as his to plan.

“You have a lot of pent-up pain,” he told The Associated Press, noting that with government border policies in disarray, “the majority of the work falls to faith communities to pick up the pieces and deal with the consequences.”

In October, Bishop Seitz issued a statement expressing his disappointment that Title 42 had been expanded to Venezuelans seeking to cross the border.

“Now we must all work harder, especially the faith community, to build a culture of hospitality that respects the dignity of those who migrate, and to continue to press lawmakers and the Biden administration to establish a safe, humane, functioning and rights-respecting system to ensure protection to those in need,” he said.