The Pope criticizes Trump’s government for the deportation of migrants and the “Tsar of the Border” responds

CNN
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Pope Francis criticized the Trump government deportation program and refuted the use of theology by the US vice president, JD Vance, to defend the measures.

“I have closely followed the great crisis that is taking place in the United States with the beginning of a mass deportation program. The rightly formed awareness cannot fail to issue a critical judgment and express its disagreement with any measure that identifies the illegal status of some migrants with criminality, ”the Pope wrote in a letter to the bishops of the United States.

“What is built on the basis of force, and not about the truth of the same dignity of every human being, starts badly and will end badly,” he added.

In his letter, the 88 -year -old Pontiff said that all countries have the right to “keep communities safe from those who have committed violent or serious crimes during their stay in the country or before their arrival” already guaranteeing a migration Ordered

However, the Pope said that deporting people who have fled their homeland due to factors such as extreme poverty, persecution and deterioration of the environment “deteriorates the dignity of many men and women, and whole families” and leaves them helpless and vulnerable.

Trump’s “Tsar of La Frontera” Tom Homan, responded to the Pope’s criticism in statements to journalists from the White House.

“The Pope should repair the Catholic Church, concentrate on his work and let us take care of border security,” he said.

He added: “Do you want to attack us to protect our borders? The Vatican has a wall around, isn’t it? He has a wall that protects him already his own, but we can’t have a wall around the United States? So you must stick to the Catholic Church and let us take care of border security. ”

On the eve of Trump’s possession last month, Francisco, who has made the protection of migrants a distinctive seal of his papacy, described the deportations of migrants planned as a “misfortune.”

Trump has criticized Francisco previously. In 2016, after the Pope suggested that the then presidential candidate “was not a Christian,” Trump counterattacked saying that Francisco’s comments were “shameful.”

On Tuesday, Francisco also criticized the use of Vance of the concept of “Ordo Amoris” (“Order of Love” or “Order of Charity”), a theological idea developed by San Agustín and Santo Tomás de Aquino on how love should be directed . Vance, a Catholic who was received in the Church in 2019, said in an interview in Fox News: “You love your family, and then love your neighbor, and then love your community, and then love your fellow citizens in your own country. And after that, you can focus and give priority to the rest of the world. ” He said that the “extreme left” had invested this concept.

But the Pope wrote that “Christian love is not a concentric expansion of interests that gradually extend to other people and groups” and that “the real Ordo Amoris that we must promote is the one we discover constantly meditating the parable of the ‘good Samaritan’, that is, meditating the love that builds an open fraternity to all, without exception ”.

The Pope’s letter is dated February 10 and was made public on Tuesday, the same day that the Vatican announced that Francisco had appointed Archbishop of Detroit to a bishop Proinmigrants, Edward Weisenburger. The bishop has suggested in the past that “canonical penalties” should be imposed on Catholics involved in the separation of children from their families on the border between the United States and Mexico. Weisenburger’s appointment also occurs after having designated Cardinal Robert Mcelroy, a critic of President Trump, who has said that the deportation of migrants is incompatible with Catholic teaching.