In its latest Justice & Peace alert, the Conference of Major Superiors of Men devote most of the items to updates on the worldwide crisis facing migrants. They open their latest edition with a description of the month of September as being dedicated to Our Lady of Sorrows. The month encourages people to contemplate Mary’s profound sorrow and unwavering faith.
“Pope Francis recently spoke about the migration tragedies that regularly occur in the Mediterranean, such as Lampedusa, with great sorrow about how dangerous the fundamental human activity of migration has often become,” CMSM officials write. “Like Our Lady of Sorrows, let our hearts be pierced by the suffering of these migrants so that we may be moved to find a way to welcome the stranger in our midst.”
In another brief, they refer to a recent general audience, where Pope Francis condemned the deliberate rejection of migrants, calling it a grave sin. Speaking primarily about migration in the Mediterranean, he developed the idea that the Mediterranean, which should be a means of connecting people, has become a graveyard as migrant crossings have become increasingly dangerous, and called upon Catholics to remember that “the stranger” is one of the poor God always asks Catholics to defend.