Perhaps the greatest political question of the 21st century to date is that of immigration. As early as 2004, the Pontifical Council for the Pastoral Care of Migrants and Itinerant People pointed to the enormous scale of the phenomenon: “Today’s migration makes up the vastest movement of people of all times. In these last decades, the phenomenon, now involving about two hundred million individuals, has turned into a structural reality of contemporary society.” (Erga migrantes caritas Christi). Since then the numbers have grown substantially, and few issues have proved as politically, socially and culturally contentious.
Despite being such an enormous and vexed question, public debate on the issue, at least in Europe, often appears to make political leaders nervous – perhaps evidence that they know they are sitting on a powder keg. Until recently, the establishment position was encapsulated in German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s famous declaration during the 2015 migrant crisis: Wir schaffen das (“We can do this”). In hindsight, her optimism now appears misplaced, and there is a growing backlash against immigration, reflected both in electoral politics across Europe and increasingly in popular culture.
How is one to navigate between the Scylla and Charybdis of the hard-heartedness sometimes found on the hard Right and the soft-headedness sometimes found on the hard Left? Common decency reminds us of the humanity and dignity of immigrants, while common sense tells us that immigration must also be controlled and regulated.
I have to admit that it was only recently, while preparing a talk on the subject, that it occurred to me to consult the Catechism of the Catholic Church. I was surprised by how clear, balanced and sensible its approach is. It shuns both the “no walls” and the “bigger walls” positions in favour, one might say, of walls with gates.
The relevant paragraph (CCC 2241) approaches the question of immigration by setting out the respective rights and obligations of the three principal parties involved: nations, political authorities and immigrants themselves. Its wisdom lies in refusing to speak only of rights. Every right it affirms is balanced by a corresponding duty.
Regarding nations, the Catechism states that “the more prosperous nations” are “obliged, to the extent they are able, to welcome the foreigner in search of the security and the means of livelihood which he cannot find in his country of origin”. Someone on the Left might respond, “Told you so!” Yet the Catechism’s qualification of this duty is not to be overlooked. Wealthier nations are obliged to do this only “to the extent they are able”. How is that “extent” to be measured? This is a classic matter of prudential judgment, and it is precisely here that free, honest and even robust public debate is so necessary. It is not wrong to ask when an immigration policy begins to exact too high a price from the nation receiving migrants.
The Catechism then balances the duties of public authorities towards immigrants (“Public authorities should see to it that the natural right is respected that places a guest under the protection of those who receive him.”) with the right of political authorities to regulate immigration (“Political authorities, for the sake of the common good for which they are responsible, may make the exercise of the right to immigrate subject to various juridical conditions.”). Once again it avoids the temptation of either an excessively hard or an excessively soft approach.
Finally, and perhaps most interestingly, the Catechism addresses the obligations of immigrants themselves: “Immigrants are obliged to respect with gratitude the material and spiritual heritage of the country that receives them, to obey its laws and to assist in carrying civic burdens.”
Immigrants, then, are not without obligations. Besides the obvious duty to obey the laws of the host country, they are also called “to respect with gratitude the material and spiritual heritage of the country that receives them”. There is a great deal contained in that short phrase.
Significantly, the Catechism does not explicitly require immigrants to assimilate fully into the culture of their new home. It speaks instead of respect. Presumably assimilation is a duty of those who acquire citizenship, and successfully assimilating immigrants can make a tremendous contribution to a nation; think of those Norman settlers who, from the 12th century onwards, gradually became, in the famous phrase, Hiberniores Hibernis ipsis – “more Irish than the Irish themselves”.
While the Catechism does not explicitly require assimilation, it does require respect. To my mind, this is one of its most important insights. It asks immigrants to respect the culture of the country that has received them, even when that culture is unfamiliar and differs significantly from their own. This is no small demand. Some immigrants may come from societies in which there is a longstanding suspicion of important aspects of Western culture and institutions. That can make it more difficult to fulfil the basic obligation of respecting the material and spiritual heritage of the host nation. Yet the Catechism insists that this respect is an essential part of the moral responsibilities that accompany immigration.
The genius of the Catechism’s treatment is that it resists slogans. It neither reduces immigration to an unconditional right nor treats it as an unqualified threat. Instead, it presents a moral framework in which every party has both rights and responsibilities. Such an approach may lack the simplicity of political slogans, but it has the advantage of taking seriously both the dignity of the migrant and the legitimate concerns of the society that receives him.
