Migrants, refugees, and Christmas

During Christmas, we celebrate Jesus Christ’s birthday, which took place over two thousand years ago. The Evangelist Luke says that Jesus’ parents were from Nazareth, Galilee, but as forced migrants they had no choice but to go to Bethlehem, Judea; no home welcomed them –“there was no place for them in the inn”- and Jesus was born outside of town, at an animal shelter (cf. Lc 2,7.) King Herod wanted to kill the little boy Jesus, as he regarded him as a threat to his throne. Mary and Joseph then fled in a hurry to save the Baby, and lived as fugitives in Egypt (cf. Mt 2,13-15.)

Christianity hence starts with forced migration and exile. When the Son of God came to the world, He soon faced humanity’s insecurities and anguish; that is why the Church He founded believes that one of its duties is to support those who continue to have their basic rights violated. The Church invites humanity to overcome its divisions, unjust relations, and indifference before everything that goes against the dignity of the other.

The International Catholic Migration Commission (ICMC), founded in 1951 by the Pope Pius XII and based in Geneva, is an organ founded with the aim of uniting and coordinating associations’ and projects’ dealing with migrants and refugees, as well as at inciting new and efficient initiatives for the homeless and displaced of the Second World War. The Commission has never stopped working since then. Successive wars, economic inequalities, and other factors have continued to create millions of migrants and refugees all over the world. In the 1960s, it provided aid to the political refugees of Latin American dictatorships and guerillas; in the 1970s, it helped hundreds of thousands of people in Southeast Asia, especially during the Vietnamese War. In the 1980s, it assisted East European refugees.

Conflicts in the Balkans, in the 1990s, created new waves of refugees, which demanded assistance and settlement; at the same time, ethnic tensions in Africa created humanitarian emergencies; ICMC, once again, acted to assist injured and helpless populations in Burundi and Guinea. Nowadays, it is helping people in Afghanistan, Iraq, and the Sudan… In Southeast Asia, tsunamis, floods, and natural disasters, as well as conflicts and misery, continue to force millions of people to seek for a safe place, including waves of migrants travelling across the Mediterranean and the Caribbean, often in unsafe overcrowded vessels, and Mexican or Brazilian land borders. Women, children, and elderly are the most affected victims.

ICMC continues to cast light on the settlement of refugees, especially the most vulnerable cases. Contrary to what most people think, there are relatively few countries willing to receive refugees. The Commission works in tandem with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), the Red Cross, and Caritas Internationalis. The forced migration issue has political implications that need to be addressed in competent international organs. Pope Benedict XVI reminded that, in encyclical Caritas in Veritate, that countries are not able to deal with the migration issue by themselves; and that international efforts are therefore needed. It is necessary to develop global migration policies adjusting international efforts to local norms in order to safeguard migrants’ and their families’ dignity.

The Commission is dedicated to the defense of the dignity and rights of migrants and refugees; and has a reason for it, as criminal organizations mingle with their large and fragile populations willing to exploit people. Human trafficking for sexual exploitation, slavery, and organ trafficking are a shame to the 21st-century civilization, and bring about alarming figures; recently, the International Labor Organization estimated that approximately 2,4 million people per year are victims of human traffickers. In many occasions, after having paid them a lot of money for documents, employment, and housing, people are abandoned in the high seas, left adrift in vessels; in other cases, after landing in the country they dreamed of having freedom and prosperity, people are either directed to refugee camps, which may look more like concentration camps, or are returned to their country of origin, regardless of the suffering and risks this decision may cause. The dignity of these people is clearly violated.

But let’s return to our talk on Christmas: the Son of God came to unite in fraternity and peace the whole humanity. We are all members of a single family composed of peoples, races, cultures, brothers to each other, and sons and daughters loved by God. This is the Christmas message for humanity; as per the announcement made by an angel to shepherds in Bethlehem: “good tidings of great joy which shall be to all the people” (Lc, 2, 10).

Christmas celebration is manifested through actions revealing solidarity, selfless love, pardon, and a simple and fraternal welcome. Why? Because of a truce in the selfishness that rules the world? I don’t think so. These actions reveal the restless reminiscences of the good that exists in the human heart, and of our true and genuine side. How great it would be if every day were Christmas! There would be no more migrants or refugees.

Card. Odilo P. SCHERER
Cardinal-Archbishop of Sao Paulo

Published by O ESTADO DE SAO PAULO<, 11 December 2010

Original text: Portuguese

Cardinal Scherer: "Global migration policies necessary to safeguard dignity of migrants, families" (132.92 KB)