“ICE agents don’t seem to be behaving well. They use coarse language and are physically violent. It appears that the way they use the baton **does not align with what professional law enforcement should do.**” Monsignor Patrick Neary has already witnessed dozens of “irregular immigration operations” carried out by federal police officers of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement service.
The diocese of which he is bishop, Saint Cloud, a suffragan of the archdiocese of Saint Paul and Minneapolis, is located about sixty kilometers from Minneapolis, a city shaken by massive protests over the hundreds of arrests and deportations of migrants accused of violating immigration laws. And literally dismayed by the murder, at the hands of some ICE agents, of two people that the widespread popular sentiment of these hours does not doubt in describing as extremely peaceful, and certainly not as criminals.
The bishop of Saint Cloud has seen those agents and that fear lurking in the streets of his diocese as well. He tells Vatican media, making a premise: the situation is not at all different from that of Minneapolis: **“ICE is very present around our churches.”** In some cases, agents have gone to knock on the doors of ecclesiastical communities where there is a high percentage of Latinos: “Everyone is afraid of being arrested.” Too many people are not leaving their homes for fear of being arrested, handcuffed, and separated from their families. “They no longer even go to work and, if they don’t earn money, they can’t pay the rent or the bills. They are truly dismayed.”
Extreme prostration
Saint Cloud is a town of 70,000 inhabitants and 13% of families are of Somali origin. Most of them are migrants, but their children were born there. And they too, denounces Monsignor Neary, have been targeted by ICE: “When the police came to arrest some members of this community, clashes broke out. Recently, they have been branded as people who do not deserve to be here and who come from a disrespectful culture. Now they really live in a state of extreme distress.” The growing anger among the population is also due to the fact that **ICE can now enter a parish, a school, a home without a judicial order**. “That’s right. I believe now an administrative order is enough.”
And this constitutes a violation of some freedoms that we enjoy in this country: there is concern that the rule of law and public order are collapsing.”
Peaceful protest at Minneapolis airport
Selective persecution
But another opinion also circulates among the people. The bishop considers it quite widespread: «Many people think that ICE is simply doing its job. I understand that fear of the other is pushing those who support ICE to consider all immigrants as criminals, because that’s how they are defined, but this is worrying». Also because the persecution seems to have focused on vulnerable migrants who have started the citizenship process after obtaining regular immigration certification: «Some are approached by ICE even outside immigration courts. If ICE were only looking for people who have actually committed crimes, there would be nothing wrong.
We know very well that the United States has the right to defend its borders, but, likewise, those fleeing extreme poverty or violence have the right to emigrate. It is necessary to find a balance between these two needs.
Widespread danger
Meanwhile, **even going out to go to Mass has become extremely dangerous**. The Bishop of Saint Cloud says it clearly: “We are trying to stream Mass on YouTube because, on this platform, no one can track those who tune in. We do not want to put anyone at risk by watching Mass online.” In reality, the diocese was already doing so before the arrival of ICE. But now it seems even more necessary.
**Vatican News**
Religion Digital
English version translated with AI