Pope Leo XIV, in remarks on Thursday, praised migrants to Europe, just days after a migrant from Muslim-majority Sudan attacked and attempted to behead a man in Northern Ireland.
In his June 11 speech to migrant humanitarian workers, Pope Leo called on European nations to respect the “human dignity” of migrants and said that helping migrants must not be a “secondary issue” for the Church.
The American pontiff, who has downplayed illegal immigration and the impact of mass migration on native populations since the start of his pontificate, notably omitted any mention of the gruesome attack on and attempted beheading of a 40-year-old man by a Sudanese immigrant on a visa just two days earlier or any of the recent attacks perpetrated by migrants across Europe.
Appeal to migrants and European nations
“Dear migrants: Before I say any more words to you, I want to bow before your dignity. You are not numbers, nor files! You are people with a family and a home you left behind, with dreams that no one has the right to despise,” Leo said. “But I also want to tell you that your life must be protected. Do not hand over your existence to those who haggle over it. Don’t believe anyone who promises easy havens, in exchange for your body, money, silence, or freedom. Those false promises are ‘siren songs,’ they are industries of death.”
“Your drama must become an examination of conscience: for the nations of origin, which must create conditions of peace, justice and development; for the transit nations, called upon to protect and not to leave the weak in the hands of criminal networks; for Europe, which cannot proclaim human dignity and get used to the Mediterranean and the Atlantic being gravestones without gravestones; for the international community, call for effective and persevering cooperation,” Leo continued.
While Catholic social teaching affirms that immigrants should be treated with dignity and respect, as the Holy Father suggested, it also notes that a country has a right to secure its borders. In the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops’ (USCCB’s) “Catholic Social Teaching on Immigration and the Movement of Peoples,” the conference outlines that countries are under no obligation to accept all who wish to enter.
Though Leo himself has affirmed this teaching against “open borders,” he only practically ever discusses respecting the human dignity of immigrants, making no distinction between legal and illegal immigrants, and not the right of nations to deny entry to immigrants as they deem necessary.
It’s also interesting that the pope brings up the risks of sex trafficking and other harms to which migrants are often afflicted. Indeed, data from the International Organization for Migration (IOM) found that at least 7,667 people died or went missing on migration routes worldwide in 2025, which comes to 25 migrants a day.
But what the pontiff and the IOM fail to recognize is that the most effective way to prevent migrants from becoming victims of trafficking or dying en route to another country that they may be trying to enter illegally is for them to remain in their native countries.
Belfast attack and other recent attacks by illegal aliens
Just two days before Leo made his remarks, a Sudanese migrant on a visa who has been identified as Hadi Alodid in Belfast allegedly attempted to behead a 40-year-old man later identified as Stephen Ogilvie. The grotesque attack was interrupted by members of the public, one of whom was carrying a hurley, a heavy stick used in the Irish games of hurling and camogie.
Though Ogilvie is now in stable condition, he lost his left eye and sustained deep cuts to his head, face, and back during the attack.
It has since been reported that Alodid originally traveled from Sudan to Paris, and then from Paris to Dublin, before taking a bus to Belfast in February 2023 and promptly claiming asylum. He was given leave to remain in the UK seven months later.
In another egregious case in the UK, a 28-year-old Pakistani asylum seeker named Sheraz Malik raped an intoxicated 18-year-old woman. Malik was sentenced to 10 years in prison on Thursday.
Closer to the Vatican, in Milan, a Polish model, Anna Aksamit, was physically assaulted and sexually harassed in broad daylight last week by men suspected of being part of a “maranza,” gang, or groups of young North African immigrants who have been plaguing Italian cities. Though the suspects have not yet been identified.
Still, Leo’s remarks made no mention of any of these recent attacks or any of the dangers of mass migration on the native population.
Reception of migrants not a ‘secondary issue’
The pontiff further stressed his belief that the Church itself must not treat the reception of migrants as a secondary moral issue.
“The Church must also allow itself to be questioned. The reception of migrants cannot be anything secondary, nor can it be delegated only to a few volunteers. We kneel before the altar to worship Christ present in the Eucharist, from whom we receive the strength and motivation to live charity: for this reason we cannot then ‘pass over’ before cayucas and pateras, since from prayer every service flows and to it all commitment returns,” he said.
In addition to coming across as “tone-deaf” given the recent sadistic crimes being committed by migrants flooding Europe, these remarks also echo Leo’s previous statements that falsely equated the “mistreatment of migrants” with abortion. The Holy Father made these remarks last fall while appearing to defend heterodox Cardinal Blase Cupich’s decision to honor radically pro-abortion Senator Dick Durbin with a lifetime achievement award.
“Someone who says I’m against abortion, but I’m in agreement with the inhuman treatment of immigrants in the United States, I don’t know if that’s pro-life,” Leo said at the time.
While comparing the “ill treatment of migrants,” which of course the Church has always condemned, to the slaughtering of millions of innocent unborn children each year unborn is bad enough, the pontiff’s comments also ignore the reality that secure borders, which he appears to oppose, actually save lives by preventing the heinous crimes listed above. A better sentence might have been, “Someone who says I’m against abortion, but I’m in agreement with flooding nations with illegal or unvetted immigrants who go on to commit violent crimes against that population, I don’t know if that’s pro-life.”
Catholic prelates opposed to mass migration
While the 267th pontiff has taken nearly every opportunity to praise mass migration, several notable Catholic prelates have denounced the practice.
In 2017, Cardinal Robert Sarah, in remarks at Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński University in Poland, called out the “outside forces” who try to impose on Poland and other European nations without assimilating.
“In what manner is it possible to remove the rights of the nation to distinguish between a political or religious refugee, who must flee from his homeland, and the economic migrant, who wants to change his address without adapting himself, identifying with, and accepting the culture of the country in which he will live?” Cardinal Sarah asked.
The Guinean cardinal also underscored the importance of rebuilding nations that have suffered from war and other injustices without uprooting the people of other countries and called out those who “exploit the word of God” to justify the promotion of multiculturalism.
“I say again that we must work together to rebuild the nations that have fallen victim to war, corruption and injustice, but this does not mean encouraging the uprooting of peoples and the destruction of nations,” he said. “Some people exploit the Word of God to justify the promotion of multiculturalism and gaily take advantage of the excuse of hospitality to justify the admission of immigrants.”
In 2018, Bishop Athanasius Schneider offered similar sentiments, telling an interviewer from Milan’s Il Giornale that “the phenomenon of so-called ‘immigration’ represents an orchestrated and long-prepared plan by international powers to radically change the Christian and national identities of the European peoples.”
