In a July 30 statement, the patriarchate said the law is a "cause of great concern" because the rights of Palestinian citizens, who make up 20 percent of Israel's population, are not protected by the law.

Cardinal Kevin Farrell, head of the Vatican's family and laity office, spoke as the U.S. church hierarchy has come under fire from ordinary American Catholics outraged that ex-Cardinal Theodore McCarrick's misconduct with men was apparently an open secret in some U.S. church circles.

The transfer is precipitated by the decision of the sisters to sell the property because of declining numbers of the order.

Catholic humanitarian organizations rushed to collect material help, bishops loudly denounced the separation policy, and groups such as Catholic Extension established a fund to shelter, feed and defend some of the separated immigrant families.

After decades of silence, the nun is one of a handful worldwide to come forward recently on an issue that the Catholic Church has yet to come to terms with: The sexual abuse of religious sisters by priests and bishops.

In a July 25 ruling, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 3rd Circuit agreed with the lower court that the Adorers of the Blood of Christ had not made their religious objections known during the federal administrative process that led to Federal Energy Regulatory Commission approval of the Atlantic Sunrise pipeline.