There is a ‘right not to emigrate,’ says Vatican cardinal

January 27, 2016

Speaking at a conference in Albania, the president of the Pontifical Council for the Pastoral Care of Migrants and Itinerants said that religion has a “vocation to welcome and solidarity.”

Although “no religion is immune to the risk of fundamentalist deviations or extremists, in single individuals or in groups,” one should “note the positive values that religions offer,” said Cardinal Antonio Maria Vegliò.

Part of Pope Francis’s teaching on mercy for migrants, he continued, is to “defend the right of everyone to live with dignity, while remaining in his own country.”

While there is a “fundamental” right to emigrate, there is also a “right not to emigrate” and “to remain in one’s own country,” the prelate added.

 

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Further information:

• Il diritto a non emigrare (L’Osservatore Romano, p. 8)