Father Jesús Francisco Molina says the church's charity must prioritize local residents over migrants Spanish daily La Razón reported that Father Jesús Francisco Molina, who serves at a church in occupied Ceuta, took a firm stance on caring for migrants still present in the city.
Asked about the issue, the priest said: a person is concerned first with those closest to them — their neighbor, a son of Ceuta — before being concerned with those who are not.
According to the paper, the priest’s remarks came during the program “Vamos a Ver” on Telecinco, where he stressed that the church is not an NGO, explaining that limited resources necessarily require setting priorities in how acts of charity are distributed.
Molina clarified his position, saying: “Its core function is not caring for the needy. That is certainly one of its most prominent functions, but the church exists to tend to its people’s spiritual needs, which it must manage — from the sacraments to preaching and supporting God’s people”.
On how available aid should be distributed, the paper cited the priest describing what he called a system of charity, rejecting the idea of caring for migrants at the expense of depriving needy residents of Ceuta of resources allocated to them.
The priest said: “If we also have to strip our poor, the needy sons of our own people, of the resources we have, we will find ourselves in a far more complicated situation”.