At the age of 40, I converted to Catholicism. A friend of mine at the time, also Catholic, told me her rule when entering the confessional booth: “Be brief, be blunt, and be gone.”

I’ll be following that advice about brevity and bluntness in this column.

Most readers know of the sexual scandals of some Catholic clergy. But the Catholic Church is involved in another scandal that may be unfamiliar to most Americans, including many of the faithful.

Certain organizations in the Church, including the Vatican, are assisting in the ongoing invasion of the United States by illegal immigrants.

In an article entitled “Illegal Immigrant Caravans and Criminal Catholics,” long-time opponent of illegal immigration Michelle Malkin – who is also Catholic – reveals the extent to which Church organizations are aiding and abetting the caravans of illegal immigrants.

That complicity starts at the top. As Malkin points out, Pope Francis “donated $500,000 nine months ago from his Peter’s Pence fund to assist illegal immigrant caravan participants.” Malkin then proceeds to list some of the religious orders participating in this attack on American sovereignty – the Franciscans, the Jesuits, the Scalabrinians – along with naming some of the safe houses they operate.

This month another caravan of several hundred people is attempting to pass through Mexico and into the United States. Mexican authorities and police are achieving some success in turning these illegal immigrants back toward home. Meanwhile, however, Bishop Jaime Calderón Calderón of Tapachula, Mexico pledged aid to what Malkin calls “the newest wave of border-jumpers and river-crossers.”

We might have some sympathy for these migrants were they fleeing their native lands out of fear of violence. But as Malkin points out, a 2016 poll of 3,200 Guatemalan households in the United States found that 91 percent had migrated here for economic reasons – jobs, boosts in income, a better life financially.

Here’s the real stunner from Makin’s article:

It’s all about the dinero. Central American workers, legal and illegal, sent back nearly $20 billion in remittances to their home countries in 2018, a tidy sum of which will end up back in Catholic collection plates. Remittances sent to El Salvador are now equal to 20% of its GDP; Guatemala, 11%; and Honduras, 18.8%. Meanwhile, the percentage of the population of Guatemala now living in the U.S. is close to 7%; for El Salvador, the percentage now stands at 22%; and for Honduras, we now have absorbed 9.2% of their people.

The governments of Central America have an obvious economic interest in encouraging this illegal immigration, which Malkin describes as a “deliberately orchestrated, relentlessly executed, slow-motion criminal invasion.”

Michelle Malkin has become a controversial figure, accused of racism – despite being Filipino herself – for her support of certain right-wing groups. I know little about her or her ongoing feud with her conservative critics. Is she a racist? I have no idea.

But because some people smear as a racist anyone who advocates for stricter border control, I suppose I’ll have to add that tag to my own list of disreputable labels. Given the frequency and ease with which some throw out the R-word, I’ll be in the company of various Americans ranging from Donald Trump to Nancy Pelosi.

As others have said many times, a country without borders will eventually be no country at all.

Instead of helping others break the law, isn’t it about time these Catholic religious organizations that promote illegal immigration devote themselves instead to the problems of poverty, lack of education and health care, and unemployment in the region where these immigrants live?

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[Image Credit: Flickr-U.S. Customs and Border Protection, public domain]