Cardinal issues plea over migrant crisis

Cardinal Vincent Nichols has called for an urgent response from the international community to the migrant crisis engulfing Europe, while drawing attention to the thousands of people who continue to die in attempts to reach the continent.

The cardinal described the crisis as the “drama of our age” and said: “We need to look at what drives people from their homes.”

Earlier this week, the Prime Minister, Theresa May, warned the UN General Assembly of the dangers of “uncontrolled mass migration” as it met in New York to discuss how to help more than 60 million people forcibly displaced worldwide. Mrs May called for a different global approach to migration, including helping refugees to claim asylum in the first safe country they reach, and a greater distinction between refugees and economic migrants.

The UN summit for migrants and refugees is aiming to agree a “more humane and coordinated approach”. Mrs May said the UK was “already playing its part” but promised to “step up our efforts” with more financial assistance.

Last week Cardinal Nichols said that people need access to economic, political and social opportunities in order to live in freedom and dignity. “I believe  people in this country are instinctively generous and through the community sponsorship scheme, led by Churches and faith groups, pathways to ensure this generosity is channelled in the most helpful way are being established,” he said.

Migration was a key theme of the cardinal’s homily for the International Mass for Ethnic Chaplaincies in Westminster Cathedral last Sunday. He highlighted the “hatred” and “violence” perpetrated against people of different race, and prayed in particular for the Polish community, “remembering the killing of one of their number in Harlow some weeks ago, and the violent attacks which followed”. The cardinal said events such as these “disfigure our society”.

The Polish President, Andrzej Duda, recently wrote to the cardinal urging him to confront “xenophobia”, after reports that the vote to leave the European Union had led to a substantial increase in hate crime, including abuse targeting Poles.

Speaking to The Tablet, the chairman of the Polish Bishops’ Council for Emigrants, Bishop Wieslaw Lechowicz, has called for the politics of the refugee crisis to be set aside so that refugees can be helped as people in need. The Polish Church believes that refugees should be treated with mercy and love, the bishop added.