{"id":9519,"date":"2015-01-01T22:42:35","date_gmt":"2015-01-01T22:42:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/secularright.org\/SR\/wordpress\/?p=9519"},"modified":"2015-01-01T22:42:35","modified_gmt":"2015-01-01T22:42:35","slug":"the-vatican-and-cuba-some-more-background","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/secularright.org\/SR\/wordpress\/the-vatican-and-cuba-some-more-background\/","title":{"rendered":"The Vatican and Cuba: Some More Background"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Benedict<\/a>Cross-posted<\/a> on the Corner:<\/p>\n

With the latest crackdown in Cuba<\/a> showing just how Havana has \u2018read\u2019 Obama\u2019s policy shift towards the Castro dictatorship, this new Foreign Affairs<\/em> article <\/a>by Victor Gaetan giving some background to the Vatican\u2019s involvement in the deal that was eventually struck makes timely reading.<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s an extract (my emphasis added):<\/p>\n

In Cuba, in other words, the church is still strong. Havana\u2019s Cardinal Archbishop Jaime Lucas Ortega y Alamino has followed a strategy of reconciliation on the island, avoiding confrontation with the state while winning more independence to carry out the Church\u2019s religious mission. Under Ortega\u2019s 35-year leadership, the Catholic Church, to which about 60 percent of all Cubans belong, has emerged as the only national institution that functions independent of the state.<\/p>\n

Still, Ortega was never popular with regime opponents because of his determination to avoid confrontation. While Benedict was in Cuba, Ortega refused to arrange a meeting between the Pope and opposition leaders. Instead, devout Catholic opposition leaders such as Oswaldo Paya found Cuban security surrounding his house to prevent him from attending Benedict\u2019s public Mass. Five months later, Paya was killed in a car accident suspected of being engineered by state agents. No investigation has ever been completed. Although Ortega presided over Paya\u2019s funeral, his family says the cardinal did nothing to protect or promote the democracy movement Paya fostered.<\/strong> Rosa Maria Paya Acevedo, the regime opponent\u2019s daughter, wrote an eloquent critique of the U.S.\u2013Cuba deal in The Washington Post. Many other dissidents are similarly disappointed with the news.<\/p>\n

But Ortega likely isn\u2019t losing sleep about this criticism. He has a different vision of Cuba\u2019s future: A few days after Francis was elected, the Havana Archdiocese published a document containing 23 proposals produced by a group, Laboratorio Casa Cuba, comprised of \u201cprofessors and researchers of diverse ideologies (Catholics, critical Marxists, republican\u2013socialists, and anarchists).\u201d It\u2019s a Christian social\u2013democratic program, with an anti-American cherry on top.<\/strong> <\/p><\/blockquote>\n

And that seems sort of fine with Pope Francis. Fancy that! <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Cross-posted on the Corner: With the latest crackdown in Cuba showing just how Havana has \u2018read\u2019 Obama\u2019s policy shift towards the Castro dictatorship, this new Foreign Affairs article by Victor Gaetan giving some background to the Vatican\u2019s involvement in the … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":64,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false},"categories":[15],"tags":[93,901,900,998,403,410],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/secularright.org\/SR\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9519"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/secularright.org\/SR\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/secularright.org\/SR\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/secularright.org\/SR\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/64"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/secularright.org\/SR\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9519"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/secularright.org\/SR\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9519\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9521,"href":"https:\/\/secularright.org\/SR\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9519\/revisions\/9521"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/secularright.org\/SR\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9519"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/secularright.org\/SR\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9519"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/secularright.org\/SR\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9519"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}