Southern California Catholic churches have seen a noticeable drop in Mass attendance, religious leaders said, as immigration activity spreads fear through heavily immigrant communities.
Last week, San Bernardino Diocese Bishop Alberto Rojas issued a decree exempting faithful Catholics from attending weekly Sunday Masses and holy days of obligation, if it is due to “genuine fear of immigration actions,” the Bishop stated in a letter July 8.
While there were no recent reports of ICE activity at parishes in the widespread San Bernardino Diocese, which consists of parishes across San Bernardino and Riverside counties, Mass attendance has gone down significantly since enforcement raids ramped up across Southern California in early June, said diocese spokesperson John Andrews. Nearly 2,800 people were arrested in the greater Los Angeles region since the raids intensified, including at workplaces and several local churches.
“Attendance of our Spanish language Masses was down about 50% on average, since the raids began,” Andrews said.
In late June, the diocese saw immigration activity at two of its parishes, in Montclair and Highland, prior to the bishop’s decree. ICE detained multiple people in the parking lot of St. Adelaide Church, in Highland, who were neither employees of the parish nor parishioners, Andrews said. Agents also took one male parishioner into custody at Our Lady of Lourdes Church in Montclair on the same day.
There were no other reports of known ICE activity at churches in the diocese, Andrews said.
With the faith community on edge amid President Donald Trump’s mass deportation campaign, many church officials and religious leaders have urged sympathy for immigrant communities during this time. Catholic Bishops across San Bernardino, Riverside, L.A. and Orange counties have criticized immigration enforcement, which they say is only adding to widespread fears and keeping people from leaving their homes.
“Since we are the first Diocese in California to grant this dispensation, the decree has had a strong impact of solidarity … and a measure of just how concerning we find the current immigration enforcement tactics,” said Andrews.
The surrounding Archdiocese of L.A. and Diocese of Orange have not issued any Sunday Mass exemptions, as of mid-July, but officials said both have seen an overall dip in attendance as a result of immigration fears.
The vast Archdiocese of Los Angeles, which serves 4.3 million Catholics and has over 73,000 students enrolled in its schools, reported a noticeable loss of Sunday Mass congregants. Some areas saw declines of “as much as half, for some Masses,” said spokesperson Yannina Diaz. There were no recent reports of ICE at any of L.A. church properties, Diaz said.
Jarryd Gonzales, head of communications for the Diocese of Orange, said that some parishes in Orange County cities with large immigrant populations “saw Mass attendance dip by as much as 20%.”
“However, in the weeks since, attendance has steadily rebounded, and is now approaching normal levels,” Gonzales said.
Immigration advocates said that enforcement during this time has largely been affecting Latinos, many of whom are also practicing Catholics. Nationally, 43% of Latino adults identify as Catholic, according to Pew Research Center, though this number has been in a steady decline over the years.
As a result of operations during the COVID-19 pandemic, many parishes across all three Catholic dioceses have continued livestreaming Masses in multiple languages, mainly on Facebook or YouTube.
In the San Bernardino Diocese, following Bishop Rojas’s decree, some churches reached out to diocesan officials for technological support, including iPads, for streaming purposes, Andrews said, to help fill any gaps.
While one cannot “participate fully in a Catholic Mass online” because they wouldn’t be able to receive communion, Andrews said, the free, easy-to-access virtual option allows people the opportunity to pray, listen to the priest’s homily, and participate in the Mass from their homes.
Most Catholics supported the decision to exempt people from in-person liturgies for the time being, with some online calling it “compassion for people living in fear,” or a “good move” by Rojas “for making sure his flock is safe.”
Some criticized that “if parishioners were here legally, there should be no problem” going to church, one commenter said. Others believed that the decree is “somehow an endorsement of people entering the country without documentation,” said Andrews, who disagreed.
“The Diocese does not support illegal immigration, and we are fully supportive of removing violent criminals who have come here without documentation,” Andrews said. “What we are seeing, however, is that a majority of people who are being deported are good, hardworking people whose only issue is that they are here without documentation.”
Officials across all three dioceses said they are providing immigration and financial resources and community outreach to those in need, such as “Know Your Rights” workshops and handouts, recommendations for parishes should ICE agents show up, coordinating priests and deacons to accompany people at immigration court hearings to offer support, and having working partnerships with immigrant-rights coalitions. In Orange County, priests have brought the holy communion and celebrated Mass for those afraid to leave their homes, Gonzales said.
Leaders recognized that having faith-based, trusted pastoral support is “crucial.”
Gilberto Esquivel, who attends the Diocese’s Our Lady of Guadalupe Shrine in Riverside, said that while he hasn’t noticed a huge decrease at the churches he attends, “a lot of faces that I used to see, I don’t see them anymore.”
He hopes more parishes start and continue offering livestreaming options, since he said he can imagine many are afraid to go anywhere.
“Whatever the church can do to support immigrants in our community, I’m all for,” Esquivel, 85, said. “What’s going on isn’t good for any community, so support is needed right now.”
The Rev. Mario Torres, pastor of Saint Thomas the Apostle Church in central L.A., said that in the first few weeks since the ICE raids began, attendance was “noticeably down,” but over the last weekend or it has “surprisingly gone back up.”
“The first weekend ICE came to LA, it was around half or two-thirds of the normal crowd gone,” Torres said. “Now, the amount of people is starting to rise up again. It’s still not to the level it was before, but it is steadily rising.”
He said that livestream access to Masses is “really needed” during this time.
“We have to take people where they’re at, we can’t judge anybody,” he said. “We’re going back a bit, similar to during COVID, when people were too afraid to leave their houses. So I think the livestream is helping the people to stay home, but still pray and get spiritual nourishment that they need right now.”