Colorado Bishops Outline Catholic Social Teaching on Immigration and Foreign Peace

Part 6 of a 10-part series on the Colorado bishops’ public policy priorities addresses immigration and foreign peace. According to the series, Catholic social teaching offers a framework rooted in human dignity, national responsibility and the common good. The article states that immigration policy should provide recent immigrants with basic human needs, including the ability to work, and should encourage pathways to citizenship. It also says that promoting peace is essential in international relations.

Denver Auxiliary Bishop Jorge Rodríguez prayed outside the Aurora ICE Detention Facility during a Stations of the Cross service in November 2025, according to a photograph by André Escaleira, Jr. of the Denver Catholic.

The article presents welcoming the stranger as central to Catholic faith, not optional. It quotes Matthew 25:35, in which Jesus says, “I was a stranger, and you welcomed me.” The Gospel, the article says, compels Catholics to see Christ in those who seek refuge among them, including families fleeing violence, individuals searching for safety and children yearning for hope. It also cites the Catechism of the Catholic Church, which states that prosperous nations are obliged, to the extent they are able, to welcome foreigners seeking security and a livelihood they cannot find in their country of origin (CCC 2241).

In 2016, Pope Francis called the faithful to a “culture of encounter” and said that “Migrants are not numbers; they are persons who have faces, names, and stories.” The article states that each migrant bears the image of God and deserves respect, compassion and support.

The article describes Catholic social teaching as recognizing both the rights of migrants and the responsibilities of nations to regulate immigration with justice and mercy. It traces three principles for immigration to Pope Leo XIII’s 1891 encyclical *Rerum Novarum*, which popes and bishops’ conferences have since developed. The first is that people have the right to migrate to sustain their lives and the lives of their families. The article says that when governments violate people’s rights, disregard their dignity or place their lives and families at risk, people have a right to migrate. It adds that receiving countries have a moral obligation to meet basic human needs, including shelter, food, medical care and the ability to work, a duty it links to the universal destination of goods and to be weighed alongside a nation’s sovereign rights and duties. Pope St. John Paul II’s 1991 encyclical *Centesimus Annus* is cited as echoing this teaching on the universal destination of goods (Hebrews 13:16, sharing what one has with others).

On foreign peace, the article states that building true conditions of peace includes safeguarding people’s right to remain safely in their homelands with dignity. It says this involves international cooperation, economic justice and addressing the root causes of conflict so that migration remains a choice rather than a desperate necessity. It cites Pope St. John XXIII’s 1963 encyclical *Pacem in Terris*, which describes four pillars of peace: truth, justice, love and freedom. The article also notes that the Church is guided by the just war tradition, developed by theologians including St. Thomas Aquinas, which seeks to define the limited circumstances in which force may be morally justified. It says this tradition holds that war is a grave moral matter that should never be entered into lightly. Since his election, Pope Leo XIV has urged world leaders to pursue peace through dialogue rather than force, according to the article.

The article also reports that since 2020, Colorado lawmakers have enacted nearly 20 pieces of legislation concerning the integration of recent migrants. These measures cover health care, education, workforce development and legal support.

Source: Read the original report