These guidelines were commissioned by the Migrants and Refugees Section of the Dicastery for the Promotion ofIntegral Human Development and drafted by Professor Fr. Aldo Skoda C.S. and Professor Gioacchino Campese C.S. of the Scalabrini International Migration Institute (SIMI). They do not constitute a new magisterial document but faithfully draw from what has already been wisely codified by the universal Magisterium.
The document came about as a response to an explicit request from many bishops’ conferences and dioceses interested in developing a pastoral care for migrants that is up to contemporary challenges. It is particularly nour- ished by the “Pastoral Orientations on Intercultural Migrant Ministry” pub- lished by the Migrants and Refugees Section in 2022.
We hope that these guidelines can serve the local Churches as a useful tool to organise the pastoral care of migrants, refugees, displaced persons and victims of trafficking, offering some general operational principles and a precise modus operandi to start and develop the specific apostolate in the migratory field.
As the Congregation for Catholic Education emphasises well in the doc- ument “The Pastoral Care of Human Mobility in the Formation of Future Priests” of 1986, the Pastoral Care of Migrants is not only the work of single missionaries, but is the work of the whole local Church, priests, religious and laity, and is of such importance that it must become the object of “a constant effort of study and deepening under the theological, pastoral and organisational aspects.”