Confused Cuban Clergy

And, on this Easter Sunday, after having renewed my vows of Babtism, I offer a sermon to the Confused Cuban Clergy:

Among those who believe that “dialogue” with Cuba’s communist regime is the solution is Cuba’s Catholic Church.

Like Spain, the Catholic Church on the Island is apparently opposed to any efforts, whether they be internal or external, to free the Cuban people from their captivity:

Havana Archbishop Jaime Ortega also said that the Catholic Church would "never" support nor "scarcely accept" a foreign intervention in the island.

In a recent interview to Spanish newspaper "El Pais", Ortega also set on "dialogue", indicating that "pressure leads to nowhere".

What? The Church’s role is not to “go” anywhere. It is to firmly stand for what is right and just. There is no compromising with God. If the Church is so vehemently opposed to foreign intervention, why didn’t it speak out during the Soviet “occupation” or why does it remain silent in light of the current Venezuelan economic and political intervention?

WE miss you, John Paul II. YOU were not afraid to pressure; on the contrary you did the pressuring.

But, there is hope for Cuba’s religious rebirth this Easter Sunday even if it doesn’t come from the Church. Although not officially celebrated, Holy Week commemorations were very visible this year in Cuba with over 30 processions in 5 of the 11 Archdioceses in Cuba. In Havana, hundreds participated in a solemn Viacrusis through the streets of old Havana.

One of my greatest disappointments came when John Paul II visited Cuba and there were no immediately discernable changes in Cuba as had been the case in Poland and ultimately in the Eastern Bloc.

But maybe almost 10 years after the Pope’s visit to Cuba his message of freedom and faith have begun to take root, where it counts, in the hearts of Cubans. His message of “Be not Afraid” is exactly what the people of Cuba need right now. Even if their religious leaders are hiding behind the tabernacle waving a white flag and surrendering the host, the Ladies in White continue to attend mass every Sunday and march in silence and ALONE.

The Cuban Catholic Church’s acceptance of the human rights abuses and oppression in Cuba through its policy of looking the other way and “dialoguing” with the regime is nothing more than an embarrassing and cowardly complicity with evil. Evil must be confronted. It is a sin of omission not to do so.

I pray that Arbishop Ortega realizes that :

The hottest places in hell are reserved for those who, in a period of moral crisis, maintain their neutrality.