HOLY ROSARY CHURCH
Washington, DC

Serving Italians and all Catholics on the move in the Greater Washington DC Area since 1913

A MESSAGE FROM OUR PASTOR

For generations Holy Rosary Church has been a shining spiritual and cultural home for Italians in the Washington metropolitan area. Mass migration from Italy ended for quite some time and Italy has now become a country of immigration. While their history, culture and humanistic values must be handed on to their descendants and must be integrated within the American culture, Italian Americans must not forget their immigrant experience and welcome newcomers to our land. In today’s ongoing globalization to our planet, the United States is becoming ethnically more diversified and more mobile. The Washington region is drawing Hispanics and Asians in larger number than many metropolitan areas. The Scalabrinian charisma that characterizes our Parish compels us to minister to all non-resident individuals who are on the move in our area, as God directed the ancient Israelites: “When an alien resides with you in your land, do not molest him. You shall treat the alien who resides with you no differently than the natives born among you; have the same love for him as for yourself; for you too were once aliens in the land of Egypt.” (Lev., 19, 33-34).

Declarations of solidarity with illegal immigrants and isolated calls for humane reform of immigration laws must be translated into a balanced, rational negotiation for fair immigration legislation. Worrisome in recent years is the increasingly unequal relationship between labor and capital. Clamor for more guest workers seems a euphemism for cheap labor. Employer sanctions already in the books are not enforced. With an estimated 10 to 12 million illegal immigrants in the US – with 7.2 million employed – in 2004 the Department of Home Security cited only three employers for possible violations! And bills being considered by Congress offer draconian measures but no realistic solutions. Advocating for temporary foreign worker policy is naïve and a historical and ignores a long history of Catholic social teaching. Legal avenues to bolster the labor force is not through guest worker programs. Proposed bills would create a huge class of permanent guest workers who could never become citizens. The European experience shows that legalization can backfire and become functional temporary foreign worker policies. In our opinion, if we need one million temporary workers, we should increase legal immigration by one million. Better to give immigrants nearly equal rights and not tie them to employers and economic sectors. No labor subsidies.

FATHER LYDIO
 

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