Pastoral Care for Refugees in the Light of Guidelines of the Holy See of 2013

Abstract

The increased migratory movement that we may observe today around the entire world, and especially in Europe, is a great challenge not only for states and international organisations, but also for the Church. The problems of refugees require holistic solutions, which is possible only if the Church cooperates with the authorities of host countries and the countries of refugees’ origin, and with international institutions. However, the Church is primarily obliged to organise special pastoral care for refugees wherever there are followers of Christ among the refugees, as well as to seek new forms of dialogue and cooperation with people professing religions other than Christianity. The problem raised in this study can be encapsulated in the following question: How to organise pastoral care for refugees who have a different cultural and religious background and not to lose our Christian identity and, at the same time, respond in an evangelical way to the evident existential and spiritual needs of refugees? For obvious reasons, the answer to this question has taken the form of a short article. Despite this constraint, the author tries to demonstrate possible solutions to this problem in the context of the pastoral guidelines announced in 2013 by two dicasteries of the Holy See: the Pontifical Council for the Pastoral Care of Migrants and Itinerant People and the Pontifical Council Cor Unum.