This week, in a column in De Standaard, we were addressed as a believing community — and rightly so. How is it that we are shocked by broken statues, yet we do not wholeheartedly oppose the deportation of those who are created in the image and likeness of God? On 26 March, the European Parliament approved a reform of the Return Regulation. How can we understand that most European parties inspired by Christianity supported the vote on the “return” directive? What has become of the Church’s social teaching, the spirit of Rerum Novarum?
Last September, we met Célestine for the first time, when she came to sing at House of Compassion with the choir of the Committee of Undocumented Women. On Saturday 22 November, during a raid in Matonge, she was taken to a detention centre, even though she was not in irregular stay, as she was engaged in an ongoing administrative procedure. On 5 March, we learned of her release: to our great joy, she was once again free to move.
This Monday 6 April at 8 p.m., which for us Catholics is Easter Monday, we have been invited to celebrate her liberation together. It will be a shared joy — and in a way also a Paschal message of hope, in the deep sense of the Resurrection: a liberation from the powers of death, from everything that crushes the human being and prevents them from living. This is what it means to rise again. And this is what we will celebrate.
In Amsterdam, the Catholic Workers raise a flag on their façade whenever someone in their community is regularised, to say: “Something important for society has just happened here.” Well, we will do the same this Monday 6 April, at the end of the conference After Parliament, act in the Council: a new cycle of citizen advocacy, which we are co‑organising with MRAX and the Maison du Peuple de l’Europe.
The conference begins at 6:30 p.m. and will be followed at 8 p.m. by a convivial gathering to celebrate Célestine’s release. More information
You are all welcome.
