A Consistent, Pro-Life Stand on Immigrants : Mahony puts both liberals and conservatives on the spot.

Cardinal Roger Mahony has put us all on the spot.

He has served notice--most recently, in a homily at a multiethnic Mass--that “much is at stake in the way we respond to immigrants today . . . We must not follow the lead of those fanning the flames of intolerance.”

At a time when liberal Democratic politicians as well as conservatives are fanning those flames, the cardinal forces a profound examination of the labels that have come to define our political lives.

“The right to move across borders to escape political persecution or in search of economic survival,” he says, is “a theme of extraordinary importance in Catholic social thinking.” Why just Catholic thinking? Is there a morally bound Jew, Protestant, Buddhist, Muslim or free thinker among us who would take issue with that injunction? The problem is that during harsher economic times, we all, including Catholics who have denounced the cardinal, tend to lose those moorings.

As Mahony warns, “We are witnessing a distressing and growing trend among political leaders, segments of the media and the public at large which capitalizes on prevailing fears and insecurity about the growing number of immigrants in our community.” It is disturbing, and occurs across the political spectrum.

If the polls are to be believed, most Californians agree with our two Democratic senators and Republican governor that undocumented immigrants are mere criminals. What a sorry spectacle both our new liberal senators, elected on a platform of advancing women’s rights, now lead the charge to beef up the Border Patrol to hunt down women and children.

What kind of “feminist” favors arresting a Mexican mother and child and deporting them back to a life of poverty? What “choice” does the Chinese garment worker mother have but to sneak into this country to earn dollars to send back home so her kids will not starve?

On the other side of the political ledger, we have a Republican governor who knows well how California business has profited from a century of cheap immigrant labor, now blaming those workers for a downturn in the business cycle. Why has he suddenly forgotten the conservative rhetoric about the law of supply and demand and the wonders of the free market? If the jobs weren’t here for the immigrants, they wouldn’t come.

Then there are the “pro-family” conservatives who thrill to the cardinal’s message when it is anti-abortion but are critical when he asserts the sanctity of life beyond the fetus stage.

What does it means to be “pro-life” if you would deny health care to a pregnant mother or child simply because they have no papers? How can you be against birth control for the world’s people, claiming that the fetus is sacredly alive, and yet be so contemptuous toward the immigrant fetus who has become a child?

You may not agree with the cardinal’s view of the point of origin of life, and I don’t, but the love he has shown for all children earns respect for the totality of his pro-life position.

Last year, Mahony acted that commitment to the born as well as the unborn in opposing Gov. Pete Wilson’s welfare-cut initiative, which would have been disastrous for the 70% of recipients who are children. Now, Mahony has raised the same concern for immigrant children. Unfortunately, he has been scorned more than praised for his stand. Some have suggested that he is overstepping the line between church and state by commenting on public-policy matters. I doubt if those critics object to the cardinal’s stands on other social issues, such as his crusade against what he calls pornography. He loses my vote on that one as well, but he’s not running for office. He is, rather, a moral leader in our community, whose articulate voice needs to be heard.

The cardinal’s critics also tend to find a dark motive in the fact that many immigrants are Catholic, with the implication being that there is a pecuniary interest in expanded church membership. Absurd. Given the enormous needs of the immigrant community that the Catholic Church has attempted to meet, the cardinal’s welcoming posture can hardly be judged cost-effective, let alone profitable.

One shudders to think what life would be like in Los Angeles were it not for the cohesive force provided by the Catholic Church in the communities abandoned by our civic and business institutions.

Why are the critics giving the cardinal a hard time when all he’s done is heed the command of Scripture “to love the stranger,” and, as he says, the time-honored refrain of monks welcoming travelers to their monasteries: “In the stranger, we encounter Christ.”