The following is a letter to the editor the local Pax Christi USA group in Northwest Minnesota wrote. 

Our Northwest Minnesota Pax Christi group agrees with the following position taken by PCUSA (Pax Christi USA):

Pax Christi USA is astonished, embarrassed, and deeply disturbed by the recent treatment of immigrants and the inhumane policies that have been put in place in an attempt to curb and to punish undocumented immigrants.

Actions by the current presidential administration include: Immigration Customs Enforcement (ICE) lured workers into captivity with donuts; young toddlers (even a nursing baby) are taken away from their parents; children who have been separated from parents are being held inhumanely. The detention centers are concentration camps; keeping children indoors for 22 hours a day is torture. Furthermore, Attorney General Jeff Sessions will no longer grant asylum for victims of domestic abuse or gang violence.

Never is it acceptable to separate families and keep parents and children from knowing where the other is being detained. Rejecting asylum seekers is often the same as a death sentence for them. Disconcerting, also, are the references to Scripture to excuse the fact that the U.S. has currently lost its moral compass. This is not the America Pax Christi USA believes in or wants.

Even the UN Commissioner on Human Rights has rebuked the United States for these policies. It is time to protest and demand that these affronts to humankind stop immediately.

Anne DeMers
Chris Boike
Denise Schonhardt
Dianne Maresh
Joanne Johnson
Laurian Lasha
Lorraine Kraft
Lou Ann Olson
Marsha Odom
Mary Ellen Proulx
Willard Brunelle
Pax Christi Northwest Minnesota

Originally published in the Crookston Times

2 thoughts on “Local Pax Christi USA Group in Northwest Minnesota Speaks Up with Letter to the Editor on Immigration”

  1. Isn’t EVERYONE made in the “image and likeness of Christ”???? What happened to our eyesight/vision?

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  2. We are one of the two PAX CHRISTI groups in the Green Bay Diocese in Northeast WI. We are P.C Omro/Oshkosh and we have our round-table discussions and involvement at the Casa Esther Catholic Worker House in Omro. I am (Fr.) Joe Mattern and serve as the director. Immigration reform and the plight of our immigrant families at the border have us deeply involved. We endorse that letter and powerful statement from that P.C group in MN. Fr. Joe Mattern

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