Feb 29, 2016 / 18:02 pm
Obtaining U.S. citizenship could be life-changing for legal residents in Southern California, and Catholics want to help.
"If we work this year to encourage naturalization and citizenship, this will make a real difference in the lives of hundreds of thousands of people," Archbishop Jose H. Gomez of Los Angeles said Feb. 27.
"We have to keep concentrating on the 'human face' of immigration reform: the names, the stories, the families. Mothers and fathers, sons and daughters. We need to show that these faces today are no different from the generations of immigrants that came before."
The archbishop spoke at the second Immigration Summit at the Diocese of Orange's Christ Cathedral in Garden Grove. The annual event focuses on Catholic efforts to help immigrants and is organized by the Catholic bishops of Southern California.