MIGRATION: NOTES FROM THE ASSEMBLY OF THE ASSOCIATION OF US CATHOLIC PRIESTS

Fr. Paul promised that he would share some notes from the assembly he attended June 27-30,  2016. Here is the second installment. 

Topic: Migration

Most of us know in our head that we came from immigrants who arrived here to lots of hostility, but it is easy to forget that in our daily lives. The focus of this talk was that there would be no Catholic Faith without migration.

First, God is the primordial migrant on the move. God “migrates” into the world, becoming human. Often migration happens because of need; God, on the other hand, migrated out of an abundance of love. Like a migrant, God is rooted in his homeland (divine) and in a new place as a stranger (human). Thus the divinity and humanity of Christ!

Jesus is the perfect image of God the Migrant:

1. Many of his ancestors were foreigners (e.g. Ruth)
   
2. He was born far from his home
   
3. He was a refugee in Egypt
4. He was rejected by his home town
5. He was itinerant (nowhere to lay his head)
6. He went to the people on the margins
7. He crossed cultural borders
8. He welcomes ALL into his Kingdom
9. He washed the feet of his disciples
10. He cooked for the disciples after their night of fishing

The American Catholic Church would never have existed without migration. In fact, from the Church’s beginning in a small section of the Middle East, 8 large migrations have contributed to its existence in all corners of the globe, that is, the Church has been an “institutional migrant.” Dealing with migration, welcoming the stranger among us, is central to who and what we are as a Church.