World News
Bishop says heading border diocese 'a powerful learning experience'
Published: November 2, 2009
WASHINGTON (CNS) -- Being the bishop of a border diocese has proven "a powerful learning experience," said Bishop Gerald F. Kicanas of Tucson, Ariz. Although, during his time in Chicago as a priest and auxiliary bishop, he had awareness of and contact with immigrant populations, being on the border has given Bishop Kicanas the opportunity to see "the struggle of migrants to realize their dreams, to be aware of their fears, their aspirations," he said. Bishop Kicanas, vice president of the U.S. bishops, made his remarks in an interview with Catholic News Service prior to his address at a Jesuit Refugee Service-sponsored conference, "Crisis at Our Borders: The Human Reality Behind the Immigration Debate," held Oct. 29 at Georgetown University in Washington. "A migrant is a person possessed by a dream -- just like us," Bishop Kicanas said at the conference, co-hosted by the Institute for the Study of International Migration, Woodstock Theological Center and the university's Center for Social Justice Research, Teaching and Service. "Migration is a problem that calls for international solutions," Bishop Kicanas added, noting that migration is an issue with "every country in the world," because of war, torture, weather, refugees and the economy.
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