I am the first to admit that, while raised Roman Catholic and educated almost exclusively by the Archdiocese (grade school and high school) and the Jesuits (undergraduate, graduate and law school), I do not always share each and every policy point of view of the Catholic Church.  However, there are times when I find a deep and profound connection to my Catholic heritage such as when I read Archbishop Carlson's most recent letter in the St. Louis Review entitled:  Before the Cross; We are an immigrant Church called to welcome strangers.  I am often asked why we do what we do, seemingly always at odds with the Federal, State and local governments, always the "David" fighting the "Goliath" and often times with less than spectacular remuneration.  I cannot give a better answer than Archbishop Carlson when he writes (referring back to the 2000 US Catholic Conference of Bishops' pastoral letter entitled Welcoming the Stranger Among Us: Unity in Diversity):

Looking back on the history of Catholicism in our country, we calledattention to the waves of immigration that shaped the character of ournation and of our local churches, including the Archdiocese of St.Louis. We also observed that the immigrant experience, which is deeplyrooted in our country's religious, social and political history, ischanging. Whereas previous immigrants came to the United States,"predominately from Europe or as slaves from Africa, the new immigrantscome from Latin America and the Caribbean, Asia and the Pacificislands, the Middle East, Africa, Eastern Europe and the former SovietUnion and Yugoslavia"

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As a Catholic community, we vigorously support our nation's right andresponsibility to provide secure boundaries for the protection of ourpeople and to guard against those who would do us harm. At the sametime, we reject all positions or policies that are anti-immigrant,nativist, ethnocentric or racist. Such narrow and destructive views areprofoundly anti-American. They oppose the principles of human dignityand freedom that are the foundation for our American way of life -- away that has historically been extended to all who have come to ourshores seeking life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness in a just andprosperous society. These divisive and exclusionary attitudes are alsoprofoundly anti-Catholic. They deny the dignity of human persons whoare made in God's image, and they contradict the essential unity andcatholicity to which we are called as members of the one family of God.

I couldn't have said it better myself. Thank you Archbishop Carlson for speaking clearly and forcefully on this most  "American" and  "Catholic" issue.

To read Archbishop Carlson's letter in its entirety  click here.  

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