MEXICO CITY – The chaotic scene in Tijuana Nov. 25 -- when migrants, including women and children, were repelled from the U.S. border with tear gas -- prompted the closure of one of the world's busiest border crossings. It also showed the increasing impatience and despair of thousands of caravan participants, who could spend months in an uncomfortable camp as they wait to present asylum claims to U.S. officials.

MEXICO CITY – The first participants in the caravan of Central Americans arriving in Tijuana, Mexico, were met with hostility as residents of an affluent neighbourhood confronted migrants wanting to camp on a beach near the border fence separating the United States and Mexico.

More than 7,000 Honduran migrants including children have crossed the Guatemalan and Mexican borders and are marching toward the United States. Some people, including the American president, are describing them as murderers, rapists, “very bad criminals.” Helicopters are hovering over them, while the border patrol and the military have been alerted. There are calls to close the border.

A caravan of up to 7,000 migrants heading north through Mexico toward a possible showdown at the American border are highlighting an urgent issue in Canadian refugee policy. 

TAPACHULA, Mexico – Bishop Jaime Calderón Calderón of Tapachula, Mexico praised the generosity of lay people and priests aiding migrants in his diocese.

EDMONTON – Thirteen-year-old Emmanuel Eremionkhale knows one or two words in Esan, and a couple more in Igbo, the Nigerian languages of his father and mother.

The victory of the Coalition Avenir Québec (CAQ) in the recent Quebec election reflects the growing acceptance of political parties vowing to tighten immigration policies and numbers. 

VATICAN – Helping young migrants hold fast to their cultural and religious identity, especially in situations where they are a minority, was a recurring topic at the Synod of Bishops.

OTTAWA – A new survey shows Canada’s high levels of immigration are making the country more religious and heightening the need to respect religion’s place in the public square, says Andrew Bennett, Canada’s former ambassador for religious freedom.

How little it takes. How few people cross our borders before we allow narratives of fear to start taking hold of us. 

WARSAW, Poland – German Catholic leaders condemned anti-immigrant riots in an eastern Germany town that erupted after a German man was killed in a brawl with migrants.

The recess bell rings and a child dives for cover underneath her desk. A teacher is at the front of the classroom but a student is wandering from desk to desk starting conversations of his own. The lunch bell rings and several pupils have arrived without lunch, or uniforms, or gym clothes. A six-year-old turns up in school mid-morning, but doesn’t have enough English to tell the school secretary who she is, where she’s from or where she’s supposed to be.

Prophetic letter

Re: Canada took wrong side in Humane Vitae debate (July 8-15):

Thank you Fr. Raymond de Souza for revisiting Humanae Vitae and the Canadian bishops’ undermining of the wisdom and beauty of Pope Paul VI’s encyclical on human life.

It is worth reading afresh this prophetic love letter from Pope Paul VI, readily available on the vatican.va website. 

Artificial contraception/birth control has resulted in worldwide misery. Dr. Janet Smith has done exceptional work in recording this. 

As artificial birth control grew in use, so did the rate of divorces and the rate of STIs. Fr. Silvestre Birngruber in his 1954 book, Morals for Lay People, wrote: If artificial contraception becomes widely practised, abortion on demand will follow as a natural consequence. 

We know the truth of this prediction. Pope Paul VI also foresaw the tragedy if public authorities/governments became involved in artificial birth control. 

One doesn’t need advanced degrees in medicine to realize that one cannot keep pumping chemicals into a woman’s body and not expect undesirable consequences.

David Hogg,

Toronto, Ont.

Anyone who has stepped inside a church in the last 40 years doesn’t need a nationwide poll to tell them that the most religious Canadians are the newest Canadians. Immigrants are driving the bus for almost every faith community in Canada, but none more-so than Catholics.

The Church, with its long history of serving the poor and the persecuted, must play a key role in dealing with the global migration crisis.