L.A. archbishop leads prayer for immigrants as students demonstrate
Los Angeles Archbishop José H. Gomez celebrated what he called a “mass for peace” at Our Lady of the Angels on Wednesday, stopping just short of directly calling on the Trump administration to end its aggressive immigration enforcement efforts as protesters gathered just blocks away.
“We are united with everyone in our country who prays for peace, and especially for immigrants in our country,” Gomez said during a speech from the pulpit Wednesday afternoon.
“Today we pray especially for our government leaders, for law enforcement officers, and for those who are protesting and defending immigrant families in this fight here in Los Angeles.”
As police helicopters hovered over the nearby protest, the archbishop called on God to “awaken again the conscience of Americans.”
Parishioners fill the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels for a mass presided over by Archbishop José H. Gomez.
(Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times)
His remarks coincided with a student walkout, with teenage protesters converging on the Metropolitan Detention Center about a mile and a half away.
More than 500 students carrying signs and draping flags gathered at the intersection of Aliso and Los Angeles streets and marched toward the prison, where a swarm of police officers stood behind yellow caution tape.
Kiro Perez, a freshman at Robert F. Kennedy Community Schools, held a sign above her bleached green hair that read, “My parents work harder than the president.” »
“I’m fighting for my father, my mother, my brothers and sisters and everyone else,” Kiro said.
After working for more than a decade, his father had his green card application approved less than two years ago, Kiro said. She said that for months he obsessively checked ICE activity and lived in fear.
“I don’t want him to be afraid anymore,” she said.
Los Angeles is the largest archdiocese in the United States, home to 3.8 million Catholics. A majority of worshipers are immigrants and an overwhelming majority are Latino. Born in Mexico, Gomez is the first Latino to serve as archbishop of Los Angeles and the highest-ranking Latino bishop in the United States, according to the Church.
Religious leaders are increasingly at odds with the president, despite a long-standing strategic alignment between the administration and the ascendant conservative wing of American Catholicism.
Archbishop José H. Gomez presides at Mass Wednesday.
(Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times)
“I don’t know if anyone agrees with what’s happening right now,” said Isaac Cuevas, the archdiocese’s senior director of life, justice and peace. “We shouldn’t be that kind of people.”
Catholic institutions across the region responded to last year’s aggressive raids with an outburst of charity, reorganizing many food pantries around food delivery and reaching out directly to communities described by many as under siege.
But the political response has been more discreet. Some clergy have joined the protests, but the Church has largely been reluctant to take similar action at the highest levels.
A nun walks through Notre-Dame des Anges Cathedral on Wednesday.
(Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times)
“It breaks my heart, because I’m an immigrant,” said Lupita Sanchez, a Franciscan nun who joined the Mass Wednesday. “The only way to help the world is to pray. »
Prayer was also at the heart of Gomez’s message Wednesday. But other Catholics were more critical.
“The clergy who are on the ground were there from day one, not only doing charity work but also working for justice,” said Catholic activist Rosa Manriquez. “We now have quite a few bishops and cardinals coming and being present, which is very important. As far as our archdiocese is concerned, not so much.”
Gomez is a longtime member of Opus Dei, a conservative Catholic movement with deep ties to the Trump administration.
Vice President JD Vance underwent a conversion in 2019 infused with some of the group’s most prominent thinkers. The late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia was a member, and five of the nine sitting justices are conservative Catholics with ties to the group.
Members of the Catholic Church fill the cathedral.
(Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times)
Trump’s new nominee to the 9th Circuit, Eric Tung, also converted under the movement’s influence.
“At the time of the rise of this regime, our archbishop was president of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops,” Manriquez said. “Their silence enabled this. You can’t argue with the statistics on how many Catholics voted for this regime.”
In the 2024 election, 1 in 5 Trump voters identified as Catholic, according to a Pew Research Center study.
Pope Leo XIV, pictured leading a mass in December, forcefully condemned the Trump administration’s aggressive tactics.
(Chris McGrath/Getty Images)
Pope Leo XIV, who became bishop of Rome after the death of Pope Francis last spring, forcefully condemned the administration’s aggressive tactics, calling them “extremely disrespectful.” Last fall, the powerful United States Conference of Catholic Bishops voted overwhelmingly in favor of a “special message” denouncing militarized immigration enforcement and advocating reform.
“To our immigrant brothers and sisters, we stand with you in your suffering,” they wrote. “We oppose mass and indiscriminate expulsions of people. »
Times Staff Writer Christopher Buchanan contributed to this report.
