Leaders of a non-profit group grounded in Catholic social teaching are pursuing a lawsuit seeking access to the Immigration and Customs Enforcement Center in Broadview.
The suit, filed Nov. 19, 2025, lists Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, President Donald Trump and Chief Border Patrol Agent Gregory Bovino, as well as other federal officials, as defendants.
A phone call between the parties and federal district court Judge Robert Gettleman was scheduled for Jan. 6.
Father Larry Dowling, an archdiocesan priest and retired pastor, is one of the plaintiffs in the suit, which alleges that the department’s refusal to allow religious leaders to provide pastoral care or offer the sacraments, including Communion, to people being held inside violates the First Amendment, the Religious Freedom Restoration Act and the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act.
“For me, with the runaround we’ve gotten from the federal government when we’ve asked for access and the number of times we’ve played by their rules, we felt it was necessary” to file the suit, said Dowling.
“It’s important for people to have the counsel, the reassurance that God is walking with them, to recognize their dignity as children of God,” Dowling went on, adding that those being held have the right to such care and the ministers have a right to provide it. “It seems that they are not wanting to admit that these are human beings, and wanting to make sure there is no one in there to reassure them of that dignity, to reassure them that they are loved by God.”
Dowling was among the priests who participated in a Eucharistic procession on Oct. 11, 2025, of 1,000 people from St. Eulalia Church in Maywood to the center, a little over a mile away.
The procession and several subsequent attempts to visit and bring the Eucharist to people held inside the center were organized by the Coalition for Spiritual and Public Leadership, a nonprofit organization grounded in Catholic social teaching that counts individuals and institutions such as parishes and universities among its members.
The group also organized a Nov. 1, 2025, Mass down the block from the center. The Mass included an attempt by a small delegation of priests, women religious and other leaders to bring Communion to detainees, which was denied, and there was a subsequent attempt Christmas Eve.
Jesuit Father Dan Hartnett, who participated in both the October procession and the All Saints Day Mass, said providing pastoral care, and, for Catholics, the sacraments, can broaden the horizons of people who have been arrested or detained.
“It can instill within them again hope, that God hasn’t given up on them,” said Hartnett, a plaintiff in the suit who also ministers at Cook County Jail through Kolbe House. “It’s a key moment in a person’s life — when you’re detained, sometimes you want to give up on life completely.”
Coalition leaders said they have tried to follow whatever rules or procedures DHS has said apply, sending registered letters a week in advance, emailing, trying to meet in person with DHS and conveying requests through the mayor of Broadview and the Illinois State Police.
According to the complaint filed by attorneys Tom Geoghegan and Patrick V. Dahlstrom, the Oct. 11 attempt was denied because of “safety and security concerns and the transitory nature” of the Broadview facility, and the Nov. 1 attempt was denied because of “safety and security concerns.”
However, members of the delegations who attempted to bring Communion to people held inside the center had experience ministering in prisons and jails, including Mercy Sister JoAnn Persch, who began visiting people in the Broadview center in 2010.
At the time, the center was used to process people who were about to be deported, who were usually there for less than a day.
“Despite the long history of religious access to the Broadview detention center established through the persistence and perseverance of the late Sister JoAnn Persch, RSM, and Sister Pat Murphy, RSM, recent months have brought shifting, contradictory and often opaque communication from DHS and ICE officials. Faced with this lack of honesty and transparency, we were left with no choice but to file this lawsuit,” Michael N. Okinczyc-Cruz, executive director of the coalition, said in a statement.
Sister JoAnn, who died Nov. 14, 2025, and her longtime partner in ministry, Mercy Sister Pat Murphy, who died July 21, 2025, were among a group who had prayed the rosary outside the center every Friday morning for nearly 20 years. They had to move from their spot in front of the center after “Operation Midway Blitz,” an increased immigration enforcement effort that featured federal agents wearing masks pulling people they suspected of not having legal status from streets and yards.
On several occasions, when neighbors recorded their actions on phones, yelled or blew whistles to draw attention to their presence or tried to impede their progress, the agents discharged tear gas or other chemical irritants in Chicago and suburban neighborhoods.
They also discharged such irritants as well as “less lethal” munitions such as rubber projectiles or pepper balls at people protesting outside the Broadview center.
During the roughly two months of the operation, the center held dozens, sometimes more than 100 people, many for several days, according what those held there reported to media. They were in rooms with no beds or bedding, inadequate food and hygiene facilities and no privacy or ability to contact attorneys.
Jesuit Father Dan Hartnett, who participated in both the October procession and the All Saints Day Mass, said providing pastoral care, and, for Catholics, the sacraments, can broaden the horizons of people who have been arrested or detained.
“It can instill within them again hope, that God hasn’t given up on them,” said Hartnett, a plaintiff in the suit who also ministers at Cook County Jail through Kolbe House. “It’s a key moment in a person’s life — when you’re detained, sometimes you want to give up on life completely.”
During the autumn, senators and congressional representatives who have a right to visit such facilities for oversight purposes were denied entry.
After a court order requiring members of congress to be allowed in, members of the Illinois congressional delegation were allowed access in December and saw only a few people being detained. However, they said that from what they saw, the center does not have adequate facilities to detain many people over a period of days.
Dowling said the suit will not end just because there are relatively few people being held at Broadview now.
“They still need pastoral care,” he said. “There’s no number on that.”
Hartness agreed, adding that immigration enforcement could ramp up again. In any case, he said, the church has a long history of ministering to those who are detained and imprisoned, which is a work of mercy, and it will not stop now.
“I think we should be stubborn about this,” he said. “The church has been around a long time, and we won’t get tired very quickly.”