CNA explains: What’s ahead for the U.S. visa program for religious sisters, workers

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Mar 18, 2025 / 12:35 pm

Though Congress extended the visa program used by religious sisters ahead of its deadline last Friday evening, they and other “non-minister religious workers” still face unprecedented challenges in immigrating or remaining in the U.S. to serve their communities.

Concern for the future of the visa program used by nuns and religious workers to immigrate to the U.S. grew earlier this month, as extension of the program hinged on whether a deeply divided Congress would pass its appropriations bill.

Since Congress passed the bill late last Friday, narrowly avoiding a government shutdown, the “sunset date” assigned to the non-minister visa program has been extended another year, thereby allowing workers in this category to begin or continue the process of immigrating to the U.S.

However, as Miguel Naranjo, director of religious immigration services at the Catholic Legal Immigration Network (CLINIC), explained to CNA, the employment-based fourth preference (EB-4) visa category, which contains the Religious Worker Residence Program, is experiencing an unprecedented “backlog.”

“The process to obtain permanent residence status, to get the permanent residency, which a couple of years ago could probably be done somewhere between 12 to 24 months, now is going to take significantly longer,” he told CNA in an interview. 

The EB-4 “special immigrant” category can distribute up to 7.1% of all available immigration visas, the second-lowest of any category, and contains not only programs for religious workers but also individuals such as former employees of the U.S. government overseas, broadcasters, and unaccompanied minors. 

“There’s a huge demand in the EB-4 category,” Naranjo continued. “The irony of this is that the group that’s really in the queue really applying is unaccompanied minors, so juvenile immigrants.” 

Naranjo said religious workers had not been previously affected by the surge in unaccompanied minors until the past year and a half, after the State Department designated the whole category as “subject to backlog” due to the sheer rise in demand across the category. 

Furthermore, the State Department announced late last month that it has distributed all available visas in the EB-4 category for the fiscal year and will not issue any more until Oct. 1. 

Essentially, according to Naranjo, the “good news” is that religious sisters and others in this category can “certainly start the process” of applying for permanent residence. The issue is that the process could exceed the five years they have on their Religious Worker (R1) temporary visa through which they are able to enter the U.S.

“Several years ago, a religious worker could usually, while they’re here in R1 status, be able to get their permanent residency during that period, right before their five years ran out,” Naranjo said. “But now, because of this backlog, what’s happening is five years is not enough, and religious workers don’t have many good options to remain in the United States beyond their five-year stay, so many religious workers are having to leave.” 

Religious sisters and other non-minister religious workers who are unable to obtain their visas within five years have to leave the U.S. for at least one year before they are able to return — though they are able to continue their permanent residence application process in the meantime.

“It can be very disruptive to the communities they serve,” Naranjo reflected. “Religious workers are involved in all kinds of different ministries, social ministries, working with the elderly, working with those in need, working with children.” Ultimately, he said, churches will be increasingly forced to find replacements for religious workers. 

The only way for this problem to get fixed, according to Naranjo, is if Congress votes to increase the percentage of visas in the EB-4 category.