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Pope Leo Releases First Major Text Urging Care for Migrants, Presses U.S. Bishops to Speak Out

The exhortation makes care for migrants integral to Catholic teaching rooted in Pope Francis’s legacy.

Pope Leo XIV arrives in St. Peter's Square for his weekly general audience, at the Vatican, Wednesday, Oct. 8, 2025. (AP Photo/Andrew Medichini)
FILE - Pope Leo XIV blesses a child at the end of a Mass for the Jubilee of Migrants and Missionaries in St. Peter's Square at the Vatican, Sunday, Oct. 5, 2025. (AP Photo/Alessandra Tarantino, File)
Bishop of El Paso Mark Joseph Seitz talks with the Associated Press about the situation at the US border with Mexico during an interview at the Vatican, Wednesday, Oct. 8, 2025. (AP Photo/Silvia Stellacci)
Pope Leo XIV attends the International Conference ''Raising Hope for Climate Justice'' as part of the 10th Anniversary of the Encyclical Laudato Si, at Mariapolis Center in Castel Gandolfo, Italy, on October 1, 2025. Arnold Schwarzenegger, founder of the ''Schwarzenegger Climate Initiative,'' joins Cardinal Jaime Spengler, President of the Brazilian Bishops' Conference and the Latin American Bishops' Council CELAM, Sister Alessandra Smerilli, Secretary of the Vatican Development Dicastery, and Maina Talia, Minister of the Interior and Environment of the island state of Tuvalu in the Pacific Ocean, for the climate conference on the tenth anniversary of Pope Francis' environmental encyclical ''Laudato si'.'' The aim is to find the next steps towards ecological change in the light of the Church's magisterium. (Photo by Massimo Valicchia/NurPhoto via Getty Images)

Overview

  • The Vatican published Pope Leo’s apostolic exhortation Dilexi te on Oct. 9, centering the poor and explicitly affirming the Church’s duty to welcome and protect migrants.
  • The text invokes Pope Francis’s past critique of border walls and warns that in every rejected migrant the Church sees Christ, signaling continuity on migration and social justice.
  • On Oct. 7–8, Leo met privately with Bishop Mark Seitz and migrant advocates who delivered hundreds of letters and a video about deportation fears, after which attendees quoted him saying, “You stand with me and I stand with you.”
  • Participants said Leo urged the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops to speak strongly and be more united and forceful in responding to how immigrants are being treated under current enforcement.
  • The White House rejected characterizations of inhumane treatment and said the administration enforces immigration laws in a lawful and humane manner, defending deportation operations.