9 Things to Know About the Catholic Church’s ‘Magna Carta’ of Migration| National Catholic Register

Pope Francis, in a letter to U.S. bishops this past week, cited a 1952 document issued by Pope Pius XII, saying it “is considered the ‘Magna Carta’ of the Church’s thinking on migration.”

The “Great Charter,” drafted by an archbishop and agreed to by King John in 1215, set forth the rights of the Church, the barons and the king in England.

The mid-20th century document cited by Pope Francis, Exsul Familia, is less well known.

What is it?

1. It describes the Holy Family as refugees.

The full title of the document — Exsul Familia Nazarethana, or “The Exiled Nazarene Family” — refers to Jesus, Mary and Joseph, who, in Matthew 2:13-15, “flee to Egypt” to escape King Herod the Great, who wants to kill the baby identified by the Magi as “the newborn king of the Jews.”

The Holy Family, Pope Pius XII says, “is the archetype of every refugee family” and “for all times and all places, the models and protectors of every migrant, alien, and refugee of whatever kind who, whether compelled by fear of persecution or by want, is forced to leave his native land … to seek a foreign soil.”

Joseph Capizzi, professor of moral theology and dean of the School of Theology and Religious Studies at The Catholic University of America, told the Register that the references to Scripture and to Jesus, Mary and Joseph make for what he described as a tightly argued theological claim.

“You can’t really ground a moral claim more solidly than connecting it to the Holy Family,” Capizzi told the Register.

2. It’s mostly a legal document.

While Jesus, Mary and Joseph supply the title and the poetic opening, they disappear after the first two paragraphs.

Some outlets (such as here and here) have described Exsul Familia as a papal encyclical, but it’s actually an apostolic constitution. That’s not just a bureaucratic distinction; it offers a clue to what the document is about.

An encyclical “is a formal letter from the pope to the universal Church” that “is used for doctrinal or moral instruction, usually addressing contemporary issues, reaffirming teachings or offering guidance,” said David Long, who has a doctorate in canon law and is dean of the School of Professional Studies at The Catholic University of America in Washington.

But an apostolic constitution, such as Exsul Familia, “is the highest form of papal legislation,” Long told the Register.

“It promulgates laws, defines doctrinal matters, establishes new ecclesiastical structures, or makes significant administrative decisions,” Long said. “It has the highest level of legal authority in the Church and is binding on all Catholics.”

3. It includes details on pastoral care more than broad principles.

The document is largely practical, and it’s mostly about the way the Church works, not so much about what governments do.

Much of it sets forth rules for how bishops and priests are supposed to tend to migrants in the countries they end up in.

“The emphasis is on pastoral care. It’s not really political,” said V. Bradley Lewis, a philosopher and dean of the School of Philosophy at The Catholic University of America.

“The Church’s clearest responsibility with any group of people is to preach the Gospel and make the sacraments available,” Lewis told the Register. “The legislative part of this document is making sure that the migrants are being cared for pastorally.”

To that end, the document gets into the nitty-gritty of bureaucracy, including administrative roles, record-keeping, annual reports, and even vacations for chaplains.

4. It’s heavy on history.

Much of the document focuses on the history of the Catholic Church’s charitable efforts to help migrants.

Pope Pius XII describes the efforts of his administration, his predecessors, and dioceses and churches in individual countries “to provide all possible spiritual care for pilgrims, aliens, exiles, and migrants of every kind.”

For examples, he goes back as far as St. Ambrose, the fourth-century bishop of Milan. But he spends more time on the massive displacements of people from World War II and its aftermath.

The war ended in 1945, seven years before the publication of Exsul Familia. During the war, many people fled Nazism and battles. After it, many left their homes because of physical destruction, hunger, the redrawing of national boundaries and communism. Many ended up in refugee camps.

5. There’s a heavy emphasis on Italy.

Many paragraphs describe the needs of Italian migrants, especially to Argentina (which would include Pope Francis’ own forebears) and the United States.

An entire chapter sets forth how bishops in Italy should provide spiritual care for people leaving Italy for other places, including by sending priests from Italy to the places lay Italians go.

“Since migration has been more common among Italians than other peoples, the Holy See has been especially active in caring for Italian migrants,” Pope Pius XII writes.

Immigration from Italy was massive from the late 19th century to the mid-20th century. But it decreased dramatically after that. Italy is now a magnet for migrants rather than a sender of migrants.

6. There are many references to the United States.

The document mentions the United States or places within the United States in 15 places.

Much of it praises U.S. bishops for establishing national parishes in the language of various immigrant groups, “a source of great benefit both to dioceses and to souls.” “Everyone recognizes … and respects it with due esteem” — and for raising money for the needs of migrants both in the United States and elsewhere in the world.

7. The spirit of charity rather than a formula is the emphasis.

Exsul Familia highlights the needs of migrants and what the Pope saw as the need for Catholics to respond generously to them.

“We have tried earnestly to produce in the minds of all people a sympathetic approach towards exiles and refugees who are our neediest brothers,” Pope Pius XII wrote. “In fact, we have often spoken of their wretched lives, upheld their rights, and more than once appealed in their behalf to the generosity of all men and especially of Catholics.”

Only once does it get into the details of immigration laws in an individual country.

The document quotes a 1948 letter from Pope Pius XII praising U.S. bishops for supporting “legislation to allow many refugees to enter your land,” which the Pope said resulted in “a provident law … that we hope will be followed by others of broader scope.”

It’s apparently a reference to the federal Displaced Persons Act of 1948, which allowed as many as 200,000 refugees from Europe to enter the United States for up to two years, under certain standards, including that the new arrivals “will be suitably employed without displacing some other person from employment.”

The act was subsequently amended to allow more refugees under less stringent standards, but ended the influx in 1952, the same year Exsul Familia came out.

The federal statute’s concern about American citizens not losing jobs prefigures one of the points of debate concerning immigration in the United States today.

Capizzi noted that the concerns of labor are sometimes left out of Church discussions of immigration.

“We never talk about the American workers in this context,” Capizzi said. “Aren’t they vulnerable here, too?”

8. The document recognizes a difference between refugees and economic migrants.

Exsul Familia makes a distinction between people who leave their native country because they are in fear of their lives and people who leave because they want a better life somewhere else.

Describing foreign workers “pouring into Brazil from Europe” during the early 20th century, Pope Pius XII says that their movement stems from “some in the hope of becoming prosperous, others driven by want.”

Pius also says that when he established an Office of Migration after World War II, it was divided into one section “for voluntary migration” and another section “for enforced deportation.”

But the Church, as Pius sees it, needs to serve both.

9. Migration is a right, but so is “the sovereignty of the state.”

Parts of the document quote speeches and letters on migration from Pope Pius XII.

In one such letter, from Christmas Eve 1948, the Pope argued that migration is a right found in natural law.

“The natural law itself, no less than devotion to humanity, urges that ways of migration be opened to these people,” Pope Pius XII wrote, referring to “those who have been forced by revolutions … or by unemployment or hunger to leave their homes and live in foreign lands.”

“The Creator of the universe made all good things primarily for the good of all,” the document states. “Since land everywhere offers the possibility of supporting a large number of people, the sovereignty of the State, although it must be respected, cannot be exaggerated to the point that access to this land is, for inadequate or unjustified reasons, denied to needy and decent people from other nations, provided, of course, that the public wealth, considered very carefully, does not forbid this.”

The tension in the caveats — people have a right to leave one place for another; a government has a duty to tend to the welfare of its own people — is the same sort of tension in the debate on immigration today.

The Church teaches both that migrants have a right to migrate and that nations have a right to defend their borders.

“You might say, in a sense, it’s a recognition of the tension in the world,” Capizzi told the Register. “You see this recognition that the state does have an obvious limited jurisdiction, and its jurisdiction is defined by its borders.”

“A kind of wanton, careless migration can clearly undermine the good of a community,” he said. “But in Exsul Familia you see this contention that all people have a right to God’s creation.”

Working out a balance between these two needs isn’t simple.

“This is all really complicated stuff,” Capizzi said. “And the gap between moral principles and theological application is an actual one.”

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