Archbishop of Los Angeles: Children have right to be with families

LOS ANGELES (KABC) -- Archbishop of Los Angeles Jose Gomez is speaking out against the Trump administration's "zero-tolerance" policy that separates undocumented children from their parents at the U.S.-Mexico border.

"It's just so sad. I mean the family is the foundation of society and the children have the right to be with their parents. It's a natural right, a human right," Gomez said. "They came here with no fault of their own, so we need to find a way that they become legal and in the future, they're citizens. Immigrants are a blessing for our country. This is a country of immigrants."
[Ads /]


MORE: Everything you need to know about the immigrant family separation controversy

Gomez has been meeting with other bishops who serve border states and they're calling on politicians to act now on immigration reform that respects human dignity but also protects the border.

"The people who are coming to our country from other countries, what they want is a better life for their children, so it makes sense that those families are tighter. And walls are not really a solution historically for anything," Gomez said.

As part of his attempt to defend the administration's immigration policy, Attorney General Jeff Sessions has invoked the Bible.

MORE: Hundreds of children wait in Border Patrol facility in Texas

"You know that the Lord told Nehemiah that when he got to come back home to Jerusalem, to build a wall. That's the first thing he told him to do - it wasn't to keep people in, it was to keep bad people out," Sessions said last week.
[Ads /]
More than 600 members of the Methodist church of which Sessions is a member have filed a formal complaint against the attorney general, saying Trump administration policies violate church rules and may constitute child abuse. Gomez says the most important part of the Bible is to love one another.

"As they think of using the word of God for what they are saying, they should think also what is the plan of God for the human person and humanity. The plan of God is that we have dignity of the human person, to be respected by everybody and that the family is the basis of society," Gomez said.



Gomez added that even if a person broke the law, they must be respected.