café Theology

Recently the USCCB published the results of a Zogby Poll regarding Catholic attitudes toward illegal immigration (http://www.usccb.org/comm/archives/2008/08-181.shtml). While I do, indeed, agree with some of the issues that the Bishops take up (path to citizenship, humane treatment of illegal immigrants, allowing them to see their families as a matter of prudence and common decency/good manners), I take issue with the Bishops on the matter of securing our southern border. To me, as a man who has actively defended our country, it is nothing less than a matter of good security to raise a fence or wall. The purpose in doing so isn’t to keep Pedro the migrant worker out, but rather to keep foreign fighters (Al-Qaeda, etc) out. As it stands now, our southern border is extremely easy to breach, thus allowing jihadists the opportunity to bypass all our ICE screening measures and illegally enter the US through the deserts of the American SW. This will one day present a problem in the form of a terrorist attack, and only then will Americans ask why we didn’t secure the border.

I also take issue with the methodology of the poll. The Bishops put forth this poll as under the label Catholic, when we can’t be sure that those polled are truly Catholic. As GW Rutler once said, “Merely declaring oneself Catholic doesn’t make it so.” Do these self-professed Catholics know what the Church teaches? Do they believe and follow the Church’s dogmatic teachings? Or are they like I was a few short years ago (literally), not knowing the difference between mortal and venial sin? My point isn’t to attack those who participated in the poll. It is to say that the group polled needs to be further broken down for the purpose of analysis.

Nicholas