Bishop Mark Seitz of El Paso, Texas, speaks with EWTN News on Oct. 9, 2025, at the Vatican. / Credit: EWTN News
Vatican City, Oct 9, 2025 / 13:25 pm (CNA).
Bishop Mark Seitz of El Paso, Texas, said immigration is a “Gospel issue” before it is a “political issue” in the United States.
In an exclusive interview with EWTN News reporter Valentina Di Donato, Seitz said the Church has a responsibility to reaffirm Catholic social teaching regarding the preferential option for the poor.
“It’s always the role of the bishop to speak the Gospel, to reflect on that Gospel and its implications for our daily lives,” the prelate told EWTN News.
“We have a task to form people based on that teaching of love and mercy and compassion that applies not just in exceptional cases, not just to certain people, but in a special way to the poor and the vulnerable, and that includes immigrants,” he said.
Speaking about the “inalienable rights” every person is endowed with by God, the bishop said the rights of immigrants should not only be a concern of the Church but should also be “respected in law.”
“While we are not politicians — it’s not our task to develop rules and laws — we are responsible to help form consciences and bring people back to the basic underlying principles, which, by the way, are principles upon which our country was built,” he said.
According to the bishop, U.S. asylum law is not being respected “right now,” as several migrant families living in the El Paso Diocese, located near the U.S.-Mexico border, no longer feel protected and fear deportation.
“We should practice that [respect for] human dignity when we are dealing with a person who simply fled here because they had no other option,” he told EWTN News.
Having ministered to families who have felt threatened by criminal drug gangs, Seitz said it is unjust to deny asylum or security for those seeking protection outside of their countries of origin, especially when the gangs’ activities are “supported by our drug addiction in the United States.”
Earlier this week, Pope Leo XIV met with Seitz, El Paso Auxiliary Bishop Anthony Celino, and Dylan Corbett of Hope Border Institute in a private Oct. 8 meeting at the Vatican.
During the meeting, the bishop shared a four-minute video and handwritten letters from migrant families expressing their faith as well as their fears about the future.
“I said, ‘Holy Father, we’re so happy to stand with you,’” Seitz said, recalling the encounter. “Later on in the meeting [the pope] came back to that and he said, ‘In matters of injustice, the Church has to speak and, in that, I stand with you.’”
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Vilnius, Lithuania, Sep 22, 2018 / 02:36 pm (CNA).- Traveling Saturday to Lithuania, Pope Francis joked that, in the eyes of some, Pope St. John Paul II is considered a saint while he himself is considered “a devil.”
Pope Francis prayed before a relic of St. Therese of Lisieux at the beginning of his general audience in St. Peter’s Square, and shortly before going to the hospital for an abdominal surgery, on June 7, 2023. / Daniel Ibanez/CNA
Vatican City, Jun 7, 2023 / 04:37 am (CNA).
One of Pope Francis’ last gestures before undergoing abdominal surgery on Wednesday was to pray before a relic of St. Therese of Lisieux.
A relic of the French Carmelite nun, also known as St. Therese of the Child Jesus, was present on the platform in front of St. Peter’s Basilica during the pope’s weekly general audience June 7.
Before beginning the audience, Francis venerated the relics of St. Therese in a moment of silent prayer. He also placed a single, white rose on the table in front of the reliquary.
Pope Francis was taken to Rome’s Gemelli Hospital for abdominal surgery under general anesthesia at the end of the morning audience, shortly after 11:00 a.m. Rome time, the Vatican said.
Relics of St. Therese’s parents, Sts. Louis and Zélie Guérin Martin, were also present at the meeting with the public June 7. The relics of all three saints will visit different churches in Rome through June 16.
Relics of St. Therese of Lisieux and her parents, Sts. Louis and Zelie Guerin Martin, were on the platform in front of St. Peter’s Basilica during Pope Francis’ general audience June 7, 2023. The relics made a pilgrimage to Rome June 6-16, 2023. Daniel Ibanez/CNA
Pope Francis said Wednesday he intends to publish an apostolic letter on St. Therese of Lisieux, “patroness of the missions,” to mark the 150th anniversary of her birth.
“She was a Carmelite nun who lived her life according to the way of littleness and weakness: she defined herself as ‘a small grain of sand,’” he said in St. Peter’s Square.
“Having poor health, she died at the age of only 24,” he added. “But though her body was sickly, her heart was vibrant, missionary.”
“Here before us are the relics of St. Therese of the Child Jesus, universal patroness of missions,” he said. “It is good that this happens while we are reflecting on the passion for evangelization, on apostolic zeal. Today, then, let us allow the witness of St. Therese to help us. She was born 150 years ago, and I plan to dedicate an apostolic letter to her on this anniversary.”
🎥HIGHLIGHTS | Before commencing the General Audience in St. Peter’s Square, Pope Francis shared a beautiful moment of prayer before the sacred relics of St. Therese of Lisieux, Doctor of the Church and Patroness of the Missions. As a symbol of his devotion, the Holy Father… pic.twitter.com/lRJeWuSx8n
St. Therese of Lisieux was born on Jan. 2, 1873, in Alençon, France. Her mother died when she was four, leaving her father and older sisters to raise her. She received papal permission to enter the Carmelite Monastery at the young age of 15, where she lived until her death from Tuberculosis at the age of 24.
She was proclaimed a Doctor of the Church by St. Pope John Paul II in 1997 and is the patron saint of missions.
Pope Francis reflected on the saint’s life as part of a series of lessons on evangelical zeal.
“She is patroness of the missions, but she was never sent on mission,” Francis explained in his catechesis. “She recounts in her ‘diary’ that her desire was that of being a missionary, and that she wanted to be one not just for a few years, but for the rest of her life, even until the end of the world.”
St. Therese did this, he said, by becoming a spiritual sister to several missionaries, whom she accompanied through her prayers, letters, and sacrifices from within the monastery walls.
“Without being visible, she interceded for the missions, like an engine that, although hidden, gives a vehicle the power to move forward,” the pope said.
“Missionaries, in fact — of whom Therese is patroness — are not only those who travel long distances, learn new languages, do good works, and are good at proclamation,” he added. “No, a missionary is anyone who lives as an instrument of God’s love where they are.”
Pope Francis spoke about St. Therese of Lisieux, the patroness of missions, during his general audience June 7, 2023. Relics of St. Therese and her parents, Sts. Louis and Zelie Guerin Martin, were present on the platform beside the pope for the audience. Daniel Ibanez/CNA
Pope Francis recounted two episodes from St. Therese’s life that help to explain the source of her zeal and missionary strength.
The first happened during Christmas 1886, when Therese was almost 14 years old.
St. Therese was pampered as the youngest child of the family, he explained. But her father was tired after midnight Mass for Christmas and did not feel like being present when his daughter opened her gifts, so he said he was glad it was the last year she would receive gifts.
“Therese, who was very sensitive and easily moved to tears, was hurt, and went up to her room and cried,” the pope said.
“But she quickly suppressed her tears, went downstairs and, full of joy, she was the one who cheered her father,” he said. “What had happened? On that night, when Jesus had made himself weak out of love, her soul became strong: in just a few moments, she had come out of the prison of her selfishness and self-pity; she began to feel that ‘charity entered her heart’ — so she said — ‘with the need to forget herself’ (cf. Manuscript A, 133-134).”
“From then on, she directed her zeal toward others, that they might find God…”
The second event happened after St. Therese became a Carmelite. Pope Francis said the nun became aware of a hardened criminal, Enrico Pranzini, who was sentenced to death by guillotine for having murdered three people.
Therese had a special zeal for saving sinners, and so “she took him into her heart and did all she could: she prayed in every way for his conversion, so that he, whom, with brotherly compassion she called ‘poor wretched Pranzini,’ might demonstrate a small sign of repentance and make room for God’s mercy,” Francis said.
The day after his execution, she read in the newspaper that before laying his head on the chopping block, Pranzini had, “‘all of a sudden, seized by a sudden inspiration, turned around, grabbed a Crucifix that the priest handed to him and kissed three times the sacred wounds’ of Jesus,” he continued.
“Then his soul,” St. Therese wrote, “went to receive the merciful sentence of the One who declared that in Heaven there will be more joy for a single sinner who repents than for the ninety-nine righteous who have no need of repentance!”
Pope Francis said: “With so many means, methods, and structures available, which sometimes distract from what is essential, the Church needs hearts like Therese’s, hearts that draw people to love and bring people closer to God.”
“Let us today ask this saint, whose relics we have here,” he added, “let us ask this saint for the grace to overcome our selfishness and for the passion to intercede that Jesus might be known and loved.”
“Preferential option” for the poor????? Yeah, see, that is exactly the problem. Too many leftist politicians and Bishops trying to make illegals a special category of person. People who get served before the needs of our own poor are met. We have indeed seen how much the left “prefers” illegals to the safety of American citizens. Like the illegals are all poor grape pickers. I suppose thats why they have been trying to gin up sympathy for the ones we have worked these last 8 months or so to deport. You know, the rapists, murderers, gang members , drug pushers, sex traffickers, pedophiles, and gun toting violent criminals. Count me out. Many of us have no sympathy for this bunch who walked right on into the country to kill and attack our own citizens, thanks to Biden and the democrats. And we have even less respect for those who facilitated this situation while jabbering that the boarder was “closed”, when they knew in fact that it wasn’t. Its a disgusting situation which never should have happened. And its disturbing to hear our clergy continue to defend these people, too many of whom are outright criminals, and many that had criminal convictions in their country of origin. Helping the poor takes many forms. In my book it does not include helping people trying to murder or rape you or a family member.
Before immigration is a Gospel issue or a political issue it is a social issue and an economic issue. No society can absorb twenty million unvetted individuals without social disruption and economic catastrophe. The profile of the Roman Catholic episcopate on this issue is scandalous. It is observed as an delusional entity incapable of sound reasoning. If you can’t get the temporal issues right how can you be trusted with the mysteries of the faith?
That should read familiar.
Humankind is thirsting for the Good News. Preaching and practicing the Gospel is an opportunity second to none. We need to wish our shepherds strength and stamina in carrying out the mission of the Holy Spirit.
“Preferential option” for the poor????? Yeah, see, that is exactly the problem. Too many leftist politicians and Bishops trying to make illegals a special category of person. People who get served before the needs of our own poor are met. We have indeed seen how much the left “prefers” illegals to the safety of American citizens. Like the illegals are all poor grape pickers. I suppose thats why they have been trying to gin up sympathy for the ones we have worked these last 8 months or so to deport. You know, the rapists, murderers, gang members , drug pushers, sex traffickers, pedophiles, and gun toting violent criminals. Count me out. Many of us have no sympathy for this bunch who walked right on into the country to kill and attack our own citizens, thanks to Biden and the democrats. And we have even less respect for those who facilitated this situation while jabbering that the boarder was “closed”, when they knew in fact that it wasn’t. Its a disgusting situation which never should have happened. And its disturbing to hear our clergy continue to defend these people, too many of whom are outright criminals, and many that had criminal convictions in their country of origin. Helping the poor takes many forms. In my book it does not include helping people trying to murder or rape you or a family member.
Legal Immigration – SI!
Illegal invasion of our country – NON!
Before immigration is a Gospel issue or a political issue it is a social issue and an economic issue. No society can absorb twenty million unvetted individuals without social disruption and economic catastrophe. The profile of the Roman Catholic episcopate on this issue is scandalous. It is observed as an delusional entity incapable of sound reasoning. If you can’t get the temporal issues right how can you be trusted with the mysteries of the faith?
That should read familiar.
Humankind is thirsting for the Good News. Preaching and practicing the Gospel is an opportunity second to none. We need to wish our shepherds strength and stamina in carrying out the mission of the Holy Spirit.