Church Wants to Help Cuba-US Ties
HAVANA TIMES, August 19 – The Catholic Church of Cuba and the United States want to play an important role in promoting improved relations between the two countries, said Orlando, Florida Bishop Thomas Gerard Wenski in statements to the Cuban press in Havana. Wenski is part of a delegation of three Catholic Bishops visiting different areas affected by the three major hurricanes in the second semester of 2008, reported IPS.
Cuba and the Vatican have had normal diplomatic relations since they were established way back in 1935. There has never been an interruption in these relations despite some tension during the early years of the Cuban Revolution. Washington could learn something from the Vatican in its relations with Cuba.
Pope John Paul welcomed the Cuban ambassador to the Vatican:
http://www.walterlippmann.com/docs042.html
After Pope John Paul II’s visit to the island in 1998, Christmas was made a public holiday again. After Pope John Paul’s death, the Cuban leadership, including Fidel himself, publicly mourned John Paul’s death, wrote about it more than once, and soon invited Pope Benedict to visit the island once Benedict was installed as the next pope. Last year the Vatican’s secretary of state, Cardinal Bertone, spent a full week on the island, meeting with civic, religious and government leaders, including President Raul Castro.
Read more:
http://www.walterlippmann.com/pope.html
Even under socialism, all people have an inalienable right to their belief systems, whatever these be — just so long as they are not used as excuses to oppress others. And organized religion — especially of the roman & catholic kind — is *very* much about being in the service of imperialism — whatever any particular of its adherents might fervently believe. Better that cubans dialog & work with *liberation theologians*, than play footsy with the catholic hierarchy. You just KNOW that they — the Vatican, certainly — ultimately have ulterior motives of the worst sort. Fidel Castro should never have given them such a wide opening in the past, AFAIC.
And, oh yeah — there are no gods, eh? The Universe — whatever it is — is in constant motion by its very nature: and everything — *everything* — in it has evolved thru a natural selection process. Just read Darwin. And Marx.