Cardinal Jaime Ortega of Havana yesterday urged Cubans to use Pope John Paul II's visit to Cuba in January to draw his attention to their problems. "The blind man had to shout with all the strength of his lungs, the sinful woman had to throw herself at Jesus's feet to get his attention, to return to the light and be saved," Cardinal Ortega said at Mass in Havana.
The Pope is scheduled to pay his first visit to Cuba from January 21st-26th. There has been some concern on the part of Cuban clergy who seem to fear that the Vatican, in preparing for the landmark visit with the Cuban government, might have allowed specific demands of local Catholic officials to fall by the wayside.
Cuban Catholics want to gain permanent access to the media, all of which are controlled by the state; access to the educational system, hospitals and prisons, as well as permission to import more clergy from abroad.
For his part, President Fidel Castro is keen to have the Pope confirm his previously stated personal opposition to the 35-yearold US economic embargo on Cuba.
"Whether one wishes it to be so or not, none of the Pontiff's engagements escapes having some political connotation," Cardinal Ortega said in an interview last week with Cuba Internacional.
Meanwhile yesterday, at Margarita Island, Venezuela, leaders from Latin America, Spain and Portugal ended an annual summit that heard calls for stronger democratic values and found room to accommodate Cuba's own brand of "true democracy". As expected, the Seventh Ibero-American Summit of 19 Latin American nations and their two former colonial rulers issued pledges on a range of issues. They included promises to fight against poverty, corruption and drug trafficking, to work for human rights and to promote free and fair elections. Also as predicted, Cuba's oneparty system and its ageing leader were targets of veiled criticism.
But diplomats who attended the two-day meeting on the Caribbean island tourist resort of Margarita, just off the Venezuelan coast, stressed that communist-ruled Cuba was no longer a bone of contention at such regional fora.
Dr Castro (71), who looked weary and did not seem to enjoy the spotlight as he usually does, hailed Cuba's one-party rule. In a brief speech on Saturday, he called it "a true democracy, a government from the people and for the people", that produced more benefits than traditional Westernstyle democracies. The only sharp differences of opinion came from Argentine President Carlos Menem and Nicaragua's leader, Mr Arnoldo Aleman, known for his fierce anticommunist stance.