March 3, 2023 / 3:15 p.m.
The bishops of Mexico “roundly” condemned the violent invasion of the municipal police of Ciudad Juárez in the local Cathedral with the aim of arresting a group of migrants.
The Cathedral of Ciudad Juárez has long been one of the places where migrants are welcomed, taking into account its location near the border with the United States.
Among the people welcomed, there are those who are waiting for an appointment to regularize their immigration status in Mexico or those who seek to reach the United States because they see no future in their country of origin.
In a announcement published on March 2, the Dimension Episcopal de la Pastoral de la Movilidad Humana of the Conference of the Mexican Episcopate denounced that, the day before, the police had broken into the Cathedral “using violence and violating the physical and psychological integrity of the people ”, leaving at least one wounded.
Likewise, it strongly condemned these types of events where they act arbitrarily and without adherence to legal protocols, violating people’s human rights.
Given what happened, the episcopal area announced that it will present “the corresponding complaints to the competent authorities and against whoever is responsible.”
“It is inadmissible for the authorities of any level of government to enter humanitarian care spaces for migrants and violate said spaces, which are also places dedicated to religious worship,” the text underlines.
For his part, the Bishop of Ciudad Juárez, Msgr. José Guadalupe Torres Campos, also expressed, in another statement, his “dissatisfaction with the way in which they acted,” and asked “that this type of situation not be repeated or in the Cathedral or in any other hostel in our city”.
Bishop Torres explained that a meeting had been held on March 2 with the Secretary of Municipal Public Security, Dr. César Omar Muñoz Morales, in order to prevent these violent acts from being repeated.
The statement states that Muñoz “promised that similar situations would not be repeated, giving precise instructions to the corporation for collaboration and monitoring of respect for human rights.”
“Trusting that we can all collaborate in all social work for the good of those most in need, I raise my prayer to Our Lady of Guadalupe, Patroness of our Cathedral and Empress of America, to help us all to see ourselves as children of the same God and brothers among us”, concluded the bishop.