‘Immigrants are to be welcomed’: Some Boise Catholics push back on Trump policy
Catholic bishops from around the country this week released a statement pushing back against President Donald Trump’s immigration policy. Issuing the special message was a rare occurrence. The conference of bishops has not made such a statement since 2013, when it spoke out against abortion.
“We are concerned about the conditions in detention centers and the lack of access to pastoral care,” Wednesday’s statement read. “We lament that some immigrants in the United States have arbitrarily lost their legal status. We are troubled by threats against the sanctity of houses of worship and the special nature of hospitals and schools.”
Outside the Idaho Capitol, dozens at a vigil organized by Idaho Catholics for Social Justice listened to excerpts of the bishops’ statement, offered prayers and sought to remind Idaho residents of the church’s “rich history” of supporting immigrants regardless of their legal status, said Anthony Paz, the event’s organizer.
“We need to make sure that everyone in Idaho knows that the teaching of the church on this topic could not be more clear,” Paz told the crowd. “Immigrants are to be welcomed. That’s it. Dead stop.”
Bishop Peter Christensen, who leads the Boise diocese, was among the over 200 bishops who voted in favor of Wednesday’s statement, said Marco Roman, a spokesperson for the Boise diocese.
Christensen has published statements in support of the Religious Workforce Protection Act, which would help to extend the temporary visas offered to foreign-born clergy awaiting a decision on their permanent residency applications. Idaho’s Catholic community increasingly relies on priests from other countries, according to one of these statements.
And in March, Christian Welp, the Diocese’s director of projects, testified at the Idaho Legislature against House Bill 335, which would have made it illegal for anyone to help hide or transport people who are in the U.S. illegally.
He told lawmakers that the bill would put priests in an impossible position. If a priest were to learn while counseling someone that the person was here illegally, he asked, “Is the priest supposed to say, ‘Thank you for coming in. Please wait here while I call the authorities’?”
Welp told lawmakers he supports a “strong southern border” and efforts to see “the bad guys” involved in illegal activity removed from the country.
“However, most of the Hispanic folks that are in Idaho do not fall into the category of these bad guys,” he said. “These are people that come to the Catholic Church for help for the with their legal status. They come to us because they trust us.”
Idaho Catholic Diocese quiet on immigration, advocate says
Generally, though, Boise’s diocese has not been vocal about immigration, Paz said.
“They’re not communicating so much on the topic,” he said. “I don’t know why.”
Roman said that was in part because members of the church hold a range of views about how immigration law should be enforced, he said.
“There’s a wide spectrum within that in terms of what people want to see or not see,” Roman told the Statesman. “So that’s the dynamic within the church.”
But while ICE’s presence in the Boise area may be less visible, immigrants may still be “living in fear,” said Lisa Meierotto, a Boise State University professor who studies immigration.
The nationwide “vilification of immigrants” has created a “climate of fear and anxiety” about being profiled by immigration officials, the Catholic bishops said in their statement. Though the U.S. has a responsibility to regulate its borders, the bishops wrote, they oppose the “indiscriminate mass deportation of people” and seek an end to “dehumanizing rhetoric and violence.”
On Thursday, vigil organizers sought to show immigrants that they weren’t alone.
“They have allies,” Paz told the crowd, and the Catholic Church “wants to support them, wants to love them — and not only that, but sees them as pilgrims of hope.”
This story was originally published November 14, 2025 at 1:23 PM.
