Forty parishes show solidarity to welcome 'strangers'
BY CORRINNE HESS

Mexican-born Manuel Gutierrez has lived in America for 21 years.
He has been legal for four.
"Each family from Mexico knows at least one or two people who are illegal," said Gutierrez, of Chicago's South Side. "We are all equal. There is no choice but to come here."
At a time when the subject of immigration sparks emotionally charged debates nationwide, a group of Roman Catholic church leaders have decided to take a different approach.
Gutierrez was one of about 1,200 people representing more than 40 parishes in Chicago and the suburbs for the first ever "Welcome the Stranger" Mass at St. Stanislaus Kostka Parish Sunday, in the heart of the city's Polish community.
The group gathered on Division Street and marched a half mile to the church, praying, singing and holding signs.
Cardinal Francis George gave the welcoming address in Spanish and English.
"We're all immigrants," said deacon Mike Enger of Schaumburg's Church of the Holy Spirit. "It's just a matter of whether you are first generation, second or third."
Sunday's service is the latest push by the Chicago Archdiocese to change the nation's immigration laws.
The group behind the event, Priests for Justice for Immigrants, also held public prayer sessions during Lent.
Mehrdad Azemun, senior organizer for the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights, said his organization and the Catholic church have worked closely to protect immigrant rights.
"It is a simple matter of justice and what multiple scriptures say," Azemun said. "And it is about keeping families together."
Carmen Patlan of Waukegan moved to the United States in 1975, when she was 7 years old.
Two years later, she became a citizen. But Patlan said every day, everyone feels the effects of illegal immigrants.
"It could be something as simple of driving in a car with someone who can't get a license," Patlan said. "We need to unite and tell our government we all came here as immigrants and as long as there is poverty, there will be immigrants. Right now it feels like a jungle. It is survival of the fittest."
Bill Kramer, with St. Marcelline Parish in Schaumburg, said until poverty is addressed worldwide, immigration will continue.
"If you were in the desert, you would go where there is water," Kramer said. "Our country is the water."
The Rev. Gary Graf of Holy Family Church in Waukegan said he never asks parishioners how they got to the United States. Instead, he is just happy they came.
"We need to figure out a way to make room for people who have arrived," Graf said. "I lived in Mexico for five years, I know why they come here. It isn't to see (Six Flags) Great America. It is to feed their families."