Cardinal Pell on the International Catholic Migration Commission: Bringing Christ to the outskirts

By: Mary Nolan
L'Osservatore Romano
Published: 1 May 2013, number 18

“The vulnerability of migrants and refugees is worse today than ever before”, Cardinal George Pell said last week at the Domus Australia. The Archbishop of Sydney is one of 8 cardinals recently appointed to advise to Pope Francis on reform of the curia; he is also the treasurer of the International Catholic Mi- gration Commission (ICMC), whose board met mid April in Rome. On that occasion, The Australian Car- dinal and Mr John Klink, president of the ICMC, sat down with me to discuss the nature of their work.

This commission was founded by Pope Pius XII in 1951 to respond to the pressing refugee crisis created by the Second World War. “However, the need for the com- mission never diminished, it just grew”, said the Cardinal.

Since that time, it has partnered with organizations, governments, and especially local churches to re- spond to the Gospel mandate to “welcome the stranger”. Today it operates in over 40 countries, and since its founding, has managed to help over 1 million refugees, of all faiths and ethnicities, resettle peacefully in the United States. Cardinal Pell said that he expects another 7,000 to be resettled this year.

The ICMC president explained the theological basis of their work: "The Holy Family were themselves refugees. With an infant Jesus, they had to flee in the middle of the night, like so many today. Some of our own board members, Cardinal Schönborn, have told me stories about their families fleeing just like that when they were children . The Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew has told me the same. This is a shared experience down through history.”

“Most of our recent work with refugees has been in the Middle East, Jordan, Iraq, Syria; millions of people are fleeing”, Cardinal Pell explained. Now, more than 1.4 million people from Syria alone are registered as refugees.

The ICMC protects uprooted people around the world: refugees, internally displaced persons and migrants regardless of faith, race, ethnicity or nationality. “You see, it isn’t just refugees from war-torn na- tions that need attention”, warned the Cardinal. “All people in trans- ition are extremely vulnerable. Any- thing can happen to them, because no one is responsible for them”, he explained, “or sometimes because no one knows about them”.

Some of the most serious situ- ations, he continued, “occur when people seek work in other countries to support their families back home”. There is little to prevent them from being trafficked, inden- tured, paid unfairly, or, add John Klink, “charged onerous fees when they try to send money home”.

A very important part of the ICMC's work is creating awareness of these abuses. “That in itself can protect many people and bring others to be held accountable”, said the ICMC president. For ex- ample, “in the Philippines, we are focusing on a project with the Bishops’ Conference for the pre- vention of trafficking. They are ba- sically seminars for people, espe- cially women, who feel the need to find work abroad. We tell them what can happen and how and we involve their families so that they are not alone in facing the world.

“These people need networks to help them protect their savings, en- sure that their earnings are not ex- ploited”, Klink continued. The goal of this project would also be to screen potential employers, to follow up so that the community knows whether they are trustworthy or not, and to ensure that “if any- one goes missing, it is noticed im- mediately.”

The president and treasurer spoke of other projects in the works, all them aimed at empower- ing local communities to be as ef- fective as possible in war against trafficking. One such plan is to convert their Rome office into a kind of “information centre”, both for “gathering information and for easily diffusing it into local com- munities”. Klink said, “we want to be a resource and we are one, with over 50 years of experience in the field. We want to provide what Be- nedict XVI called ‘a communion among those who are giving'", to train and support those already working in this field. “Especially women religious,” he added, “who have done amazing things to pro- tect the vulnerable, they should not only be supported but their efforts made known and emulated else- where.”

Cardinal Pell immediately fol- lowed: “The work in this area needs to be better known so that people can support it through par- ticipation and contribution, but es- pecially through prayer. We want to sensitize people to what is going on”. What is happening to up- rooted people is “so a vast problem and it has been around so long that people no longer see it or per- haps don’t want to see it”.

Happily, the Cardinal added, Pope Francis is doing much him- self to “sensitize” people to margin- alized. From the first few days of his Pontificate, he has “called us to bring the love of Christ to the out- skirts’”. He is, after all, “a migrant pope”, agreed Klink, “a pope who comes from the ‘ends of the earth’. He knows this work all too well”.

Other board members and col- laborators present at the discussion were: Cardinal John Njue, Arch- bishop of Nairobi; Bishop Joseph Pibul Visitnondachi of Nakhon Sawan, who heads the Thai Bish- ops’ Justice and Peace initiatives; H.B. Gregorius III Latham, Greek- Melchite Patriarch of All the East; and Bishop Precioso Cantillasv of Maasin, Chair of the Philippine Bishops’ Conference Migration Committee.

To learn more about the ICMC, please visit their website: www.icmc.net<

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