May will mark 20 years since I converted to Catholicism. About a month before I was officially received, Pope John Paul II died, and Benedict XVI was elected. The church had been embroiled in scandals related to decades of sexual abuse and the cover-ups thereof, and I was well aware of the flaws of the institution to which I was entering. I was drawn to the faith, despite the flaws, and made the conversion on a warm spring day.
But the church of May 2005 is not the church of February 2025, and it's clear people like me are no longer welcome in Pope Francis' Catholic Church. Not only am I 'mentally ill' and 'rigid' for preferring the Latin Mass, but my belief -- like that of fellow convert and Vice President J.D. Vance -- that America has a right to enforce its immigration laws and borders is worth derision and scorn from the United States Council of Catholic Bishops (USCCB).
And not just scorn now, but excommunication:
Detroit's Archbishop-elect Weisenburger would support “canonical penalties for Catholics who are involved” in implementing President Trump's immigration policy. https://t.co/iHdlpmOnZd
— Fr. Dave Nix (@FrDaveNix) February 18, 2025
If so, what is the 'grave sin' that meets the criterion of excommunication according to Canon 915?
The 19,500 employees of the U. S. Border Control and the 20,000 of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) have the job of enforcing the law of securing our national borders. (There are approximately 20,000 U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcements Officers. Of the 19,437 Border Agents, 16,605 are assigned to the Southwest Border.) None of these are responsible for our nation's immigration laws or for the administrative policies of implementing them.
These are the same agents and officers who, under President Obama, deported a record 2.4 million immigrants between 2009 and 2016. Janet Murguia, the president of the National Council of La Raza called Obama the 'Deporter-In-Chief.'
Where was the bishop's outrage then, towards President Obama or the ICE and the Border Patrol employees enforcing his policies?
While the article in question is from 2018 (Weisenburger will be made Archbishop of Detroit in March), during Trump's first administration, it's worth revisiting the issue given the very vocal opposition both the USCCB and Pope Francis have raised to President Donald Trump's immigration policies.
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For those of you who may not understand what excommunication is, it's a 'medicinal penalty' of the Church and can be imposed in two forms: through the canonical process via a bishop or latae sententiae, an 'automatic' excommunication caused by certain actions:
- Apostates, heretics, and schismatics (can. 1364)
- Desecration of the Eucharist (can. 1382)
- A person who physically attacks the pope (can. 1370)
- A bishop who consecrates another bishop without papal mandate (can. 1387)
- A priest who violates the seal of the confessional (can. 1386)
- A person who procures an abortion (can. 1397 §2)
- Accomplices who were needed to commit an action that has an automatic excommunication penalty (can. 1329)
Such an excommunication also requires certain conditions:
- The individual must be at least sixteen years old.
- The individual must know that his action was a violation of Church law.
- The individual must have acted freely without threat of force or grave fear, have the use of reason, and not have acted mistakenly.
As I have pointed out before, here is what the Catechism of the Catholic Church says about immigration (emphasis added):
2241 The more prosperous nations are obliged, to the extent they are able, to welcome the foreigner in search of the security and the means of livelihood which he cannot find in his country of origin. Public authorities should see to it that the natural right is respected that places a guest under the protection of those who receive him.
Political authorities, for the sake of the common good for which they are responsible, may make the exercise of the right to immigrate subject to various juridical conditions, especially with regard to the immigrants’ duties toward their country of adoption. Immigrants are obliged to respect with gratitude the material and spiritual heritage of the country that receives them, to obey its laws and to assist in carrying civic burdens.
In 2017, Pope Francis himself said countries had the right to protect their borders and that countries at risk of terrorism have even more of a right to do so.
Weird https://t.co/bP9bU4kEYM pic.twitter.com/NutP52KhwI
— Ultra Craigé Schmuckatelli 🇺🇸 🤡💊 (@CraigR3521) February 18, 2025
Seeing as the worst terror attack in human history took place on American soil, why does this no longer apply?
It seems to me the good Bishops are only vocal about immigration now because billions of dollars in federal tax dollars that went into the coffers of Catholic NGOs are going away. They're more concerned about their bottom line than the safety and dignity of Americans or the moral right of a nation to enforce its immigration laws.
This is no different than the Biden DOJ engaging in selective lawfare against his political opponents or how New York dragged Donald Trump into court on campaign finance charges that would have never applied to someone else, let alone turned into felonies.
If Weisenburger is so concerned about the salvation of souls when it comes to immigration, where was he during the Biden years, while the supposedly devout-Catholic president advocated for abortion throughout all nine months of pregnancy, and while his DOJ threw Christians of all stripes behind bars for protesting an actual grave evil?
Supporting abortion is an actual violation of Catholic teaching and canon law and an actual mortal sin.
Yet the USCCB remained largely silent on such violations, and excommunication was rarely, if ever, discussed.
Why is Joe Biden above canon law and beyond rebuke, but the men and women tasked with enforcing laws passed by duly elected legislators are now fair game for the harshest punishment the Catholic Church has to offer?
It's hard to keep the faith when the current Catholic leadership seems hellbent on such blatant hypocrisy.
