<div class="css-s99gbd StoryBodyCompanionColumn" data-testid="companionColumn-0"><div class="css-53u6y8"><p class="css-ac37hb evys1bk0">Catholic clergy members have secured the right to visit a Chicago-area immigration processing center to provide daily ministry and pastoral support to detainees, according to an agreement reached this week between a religious nonprofit group and the Trump administration.</p><p class="css-ac37hb evys1bk0">The deal comes about six months after several Roman Catholic clergy members in an Illinois-based Catholic advocacy group, the Coalition for Spiritual and Public Leadership, <a class="css-yywogo" href="https://www.nytimes.com/2025/11/20/us/politics/catholic-broadview-ice-immigration-lawsuit.html" title="">filed a lawsuit</a> accusing federal immigration authorities of unlawfully barring them from ministering to detainees at the Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in Broadview, Ill.</p><p class="css-ac37hb evys1bk0">The group said that Catholic nuns and clergy members had been visiting the facility every Friday morning for more than 10 years to offer prayer services. Blocking that access, they argued, violated their First Amendment rights and two federal laws,<span class="css-8l6xbc evw5hdy0"> </span>including one that prohibits the government from imposing a burden on the ability of a person in custody to exercise their religion.</p><p class="css-ac37hb evys1bk0">“Spiritual care, pastoral care and accompaniment is critical, especially in the first few hours a person is detained,” Michael Nicolas Okinczyc-Cruz, the coalition’s executive director, said in a phone interview. “Those can be the most painful and frightening.”</p></div><aside aria-label="companion column" class="css-ew4tgv"></aside></div><div data-testid="Dropzone-1"></div><div class="css-s99gbd StoryBodyCompanionColumn" data-testid="companionColumn-1"><div class="css-53u6y8"><p class="css-ac37hb evys1bk0">The new agreement, filed on Thursday in the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, states that members of the clergy can visit the facility to provide pastoral services every day between 8 a.m. and 11 a.m., or 1 p.m. and 4 p.m. Mr. Okinczyc-Cruz said he was hopeful that the agreement would be permanent.</p><p class="css-ac37hb evys1bk0">Federal agents had begun rolling back clergy members’ access to the ICE facility last September as officers flooded the Chicago area as part of the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown.</p><div class="css-kbghgg"><div class="css-121kum4"><div class="css-171d1bw"></div><div class="css-asuuk5"><noscript><div class="css-7axq9l" data-testid="optimistic-truncator-noscript"><svg aria-hidden="true" class="css-1b5b8u1" data-tpl="i" height="24" viewbox="0 0 24 24" width="24"><path clip-rule="evenodd" d="M2.5 12a9.5 9.5 0 1 1 19 0 9.5 9.5 0 0 1-19 0Zm8.5 1.75v-7.5h2v7.5h-2Zm0 2v2h2v-2h-2Z" fill="currentColor" fill-rule="evenodd"></path></svg><div class="css-6yo1no" data-testid="optimistic-truncator-noscript-message"><p class="css-3kpklk" data-tpl="t">We are having trouble retrieving the article content.</p><p class="css-3kpklk" data-tpl="t">Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.</p></div></div></noscript><div class="css-1dv1kvn" id="optimistic-truncator-a11y" tabindex="-1"><hr/><p>Thank you for your patience while we verify access. 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