Simone Orendain

Catholic leaders, including an official from the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ migration office, reiterated a pastoral approach to the issue of child detentions by Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

Bishop Earl K. Fernandes of Columbus, Ohio, has granted a dispensation from Mass on Sundays and holy days of obligation to Catholics without authorization to stay in the United States, as well as those who “reasonably fear” being pursued in the ongoing immigration crackdown across the country.

On Nov. 2, the feast of All Souls, Catholics in Chicago joined in commemorating the great Irish famine that left more than 1 million people dead and began the mass exodus of Irish refugees and migrants seeking a better life to the United States and other countries 180 years ago.