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An extraordinary letter from a nun to her congressman.
A Letter to Congressman Andrew Garbarino from S. Rosalie CarvenDear Congressman Garbarino:
Such is the headline on the cover and first page of Newsday for April 15, 2025. With trepidation, I was forecasting this headline months ago when I read of President Trump’s unilateral decision to end grant aid affecting refugee support organizations at home and abroad.
With due courtesy to your District Director, Ms. Boyle, who gave me a half hour to advocate for the preservation of Medicaid and SNAP benefits in the upcoming budget resolution, I did not try to extend her precious time by bringing up the topic of immigration with which I have personal experience. The Diocese of Rockville Centre is the site of one of the nine Catholic Refugee Resettlement programs in the nation. The program office is located in your district.
In the years 2000-2004, I held the position of Refugee Resettlement Coordinator in that program. There was never a moment during that time when I doubted the authenticity of the refugee claims of persons whose lives I touched, nor was there a struggle to gain their cooperation in the process of claiming the new home they had suffered so dearly to find. From continued personal contact with some families, I know their cooperation has borne fruit in the firm footing they have found in both their work and community life. The epithets that have been used by this Administration to vilify immigrants are totally without cause. Were migrants widely responsible for deeds attributed to them by our Government, the Catholic Church’s participation in their resettlement would certainly have caught their attention and would have sparked measures to put a stop to such dangerous activity.
That President Trump precipitated the USCCB decision to end its refugee work is not surprising to me. What does shock me is hearing no quarrel from Congress about actions that flaunt defiance of its legitimate role in vetting our immigration policy and practice. Nor was there lament for the President’s equally egregious indifference to the long-standing U.S. support of international conventions and domestic law regarding refugees. Retrospectively the Republican Party should collectively examine its conscience for denying passage of the widely acclaimed bipartisan immigration reform bill in 2013 which thus contributed over the next ten years to the unmanageable influx of border crossers. The immigration bill in 2023 fared no better with current Republican members.
The unfounded hostility to migrants by this Administration will continue to be life-threatening if Congress agrees to the projected exorbitant spending on new detention and deportation action. Taken together, the enforcement and removal action and the construction and profit-taking of more detention centers, create a travesty of human disposal which is incalculable and unconscionable. I sincerely pray you will not be among those who give consent to budget decisions that terminate the life-giving refuge we once offered so proudly. Such decisions will forever be attributed to members of Congress who have lost their moral compass.
Truth be told,
Sister Rosalie A. Carven, CSJ
Trump halts U.S. refugee resettlement program
Such is the headline on the cover and first page of Newsday for April 15, 2025. With trepidation, I was forecasting this headline months ago when I read of President Trump’s unilateral decision to end grant aid affecting refugee support organizations at home and abroad.
With due courtesy to your District Director, Ms. Boyle, who gave me a half hour to advocate for the preservation of Medicaid and SNAP benefits in the upcoming budget resolution, I did not try to extend her precious time by bringing up the topic of immigration with which I have personal experience. The Diocese of Rockville Centre is the site of one of the nine Catholic Refugee Resettlement programs in the nation. The program office is located in your district.
In the years 2000-2004, I held the position of Refugee Resettlement Coordinator in that program. There was never a moment during that time when I doubted the authenticity of the refugee claims of persons whose lives I touched, nor was there a struggle to gain their cooperation in the process of claiming the new home they had suffered so dearly to find. From continued personal contact with some families, I know their cooperation has borne fruit in the firm footing they have found in both their work and community life. The epithets that have been used by this Administration to vilify immigrants are totally without cause. Were migrants widely responsible for deeds attributed to them by our Government, the Catholic Church’s participation in their resettlement would certainly have caught their attention and would have sparked measures to put a stop to such dangerous activity.
That President Trump precipitated the USCCB decision to end its refugee work is not surprising to me. What does shock me is hearing no quarrel from Congress about actions that flaunt defiance of its legitimate role in vetting our immigration policy and practice. Nor was there lament for the President’s equally egregious indifference to the long-standing U.S. support of international conventions and domestic law regarding refugees. Retrospectively the Republican Party should collectively examine its conscience for denying passage of the widely acclaimed bipartisan immigration reform bill in 2013 which thus contributed over the next ten years to the unmanageable influx of border crossers. The immigration bill in 2023 fared no better with current Republican members.
The unfounded hostility to migrants by this Administration will continue to be life-threatening if Congress agrees to the projected exorbitant spending on new detention and deportation action. Taken together, the enforcement and removal action and the construction and profit-taking of more detention centers, create a travesty of human disposal which is incalculable and unconscionable. I sincerely pray you will not be among those who give consent to budget decisions that terminate the life-giving refuge we once offered so proudly. Such decisions will forever be attributed to members of Congress who have lost their moral compass.
Truth be told,
Sister Rosalie A. Carven, CSJ