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Leo’s document, known as an apostolic exhortation, is focused on the needs of the world’s poor
The number of people living in poverty “should constantly weigh upon our consciences,” the document said

VATICAN CITY: Pope Leo made an urgent plea for the world to help immigrants in his first major document, which was released on Thursday and invoked one of the late Pope Francis’ strongest criticisms of US President Donald Trump’s anti-immigration policies.
Leo’s document, known as an apostolic exhortation, is focused on the needs of the world’s poor. It calls for widespread changes to the global market system to address rising inequality and to help people living paycheck-to-paycheck.
The 104-page text started as a writing project by Francis, who was unable to complete it before his death in April after 12 years leading the global Church of 1.4 billion people. It was finished by Leo, the first US pope.
“I am happy to make this document my own – adding some reflections – and to issue it at the beginning of my own pontificate,” Leo writes at the beginning of the text.
Cardinal Michael Czerny, a senior adviser to both Francis and Leo, said that while the new document was started by the late pope it represents Leo’s positions.
“This is Pope Leo’s document,” Czerny told a Vatican press conference.

DOCUMENT REFERENCES CRITICISM OF BORDER WALLS
Elected in May to replace Francis, Leo has shown a much more reserved style than his predecessor, who frequently criticized the Trump administration.
But Leo has been ramping up his disapproval in recent weeks, drawing heated backlash from some prominent conservative Catholics.
“The Church, like a mother, accompanies those who are walking,” the pontiff writes in the document, titled “Dilexi te” (I have loved you). “She knows that in every rejected migrant, it is Christ himself who knocks at the door of the community.”
“Where the world sees threats, (the Church) sees children; where walls are built, she builds bridges,” Leo says, referencing Francis’ 2016 criticism of Trump as “not Christian” because of the president’s plan in his first term to build a wall on the US-Mexico border.
The White House has said Trump was elected based on his many promises, including to deport “criminal illegal aliens.”

WARNS OF ‘CESSPOOL’ WITHOUT MORAL DIGNITY
The number of people living in poverty “should constantly weigh upon our consciences,” the document said.
“There is no shortage of theories attempting to justify the present state of affairs or to explain that economic thinking requires us to wait for invisible market forces to resolve everything,” it said.
“The poor are promised only a few ‘drops’ that trickle down, until the next global crisis brings things back to where they were.”
The document signals that Leo shares some of the same priorities of Francis, who shunned many of the trappings of the papacy and frequently criticized the global market system as not caring for society’s most vulnerable people.
“The illusion of happiness derived from a comfortable life pushes many people toward a vision of life centered on the accumulation of wealth and social success at all costs, even at the expense of others,” the text says.
“Either we regain our moral and spiritual dignity or we fall into a cesspool.”

BELGRADE: The United States has introduced sanctions against Serbia’s main oil supplier, which is controlled by Russia, the company said on Thursday. Serbia’s president said this could have “unforeseeable” consequences for the Balkan country.
Serbia depends almost entirely on Russian gas and oil supplies, which it receives mainly through pipelines in Croatia and other neighboring states. The gas is then distributed by Petroleum Industry of Serbia (NIS), which is majority-owned by Russia’s state oil monopoly Gazprom Neft.
The sanctions could deprive Serbia of gasoline and heating oil ahead of the winter months. Populist President Aleksandar Vucic is already under pressure at home from 11 months of anti-government protests.
He said the sanctions will have “extremely dire consequences” in many aspects: “This is something that will affect every citizen.”
Vucic said Serbia will continue talks with both American and Russian officials, adding that people shouldn’t panic and the government is prepared for the situation.
“Trust your state. We will go through this together,” he said.
Gazprom Neft also owns Serbia’s only oil refinery.
NIS said Thursday it had failed to secure another postponement of the US sanctions, which could jeopardize its efforts to secure oil and gas deliveries in a longer term.
“The special license from the US Department of the Treasury, which enables unhindered operational business, has not yet been extended,” NIS said in a statement. It added that it has stored enough supplies to keep the operation moving for customers for a longer while.
It also said problems could occur at NIS gasoline stations with payments made by foreign bank cards but added that cash payments would be accepted.
The US Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control originally placed sanctions on Russia’s oil sector on Jan. 10 and gave Gazprom Neft a deadline to exit ownership of NIS, which it didn’t do.
US officials have not commented.
Although formally seeking European Union membership, Serbia has refused to join Western sanctions against Russia over its invasion in Ukraine, in part because of the crucial Russian gas deliveries.
The pro-Russian President Vucic is facing one of the biggest threats to more than a decade of his increasingly autocratic rule. Protests have been held by university students and others following the collapse almost a year ago of a concrete canopy at a railway station in the country’s north that killed 16 people.
Many in Serbia believe rampant corruption and nepotism among state officials led to sloppy work on the building reconstruction, which was part of a wider railroad project with Chinese state companies.