Change Afoot in Cuba

First Things ^ | 5/11/12 | Jonathan Newman

[marshmallow]

I recently concluded my second visit to Cuba in eighteen months. On my way out, I asked the airline official why I was given the luxury of sitting in the exit row. He smiled and replied, “The Holy Book says, ‘Do unto others what you want them to do unto you.’” When I asked him if he believed the Holy Book was from God, he laughed. “Of course! I am a disciple of Jesus Christ. Are you?”

This was the last of scores of encounters over my previous week that signaled great changes underway in Cuba, both religious and political.

My sense of change is anecdotal, as it has to be. Cuba does not permit opinion polls that could be conducted freely, and publishes little or nothing reliable on the state of religious practice or political beliefs among the population.

Yet Christianity in Cuba is almost certainly experiencing a revival. Catholic churches are filling on Sunday mornings, and Evangelical churches—mostly Baptist and Pentecostal—are growing continually. Worship is exuberant, with an intensity I have not seen even in the most enthusiastic charismatic churches of the States. Think of great Cuban music—with trumpets and saxophones and drums and heroic voices—and add Spirit-charged zeal. The result is exhilaration.

I spoke to one Evangelical pastor whose church crowds with eight hundred worshippers on Sundays. He plans to build a church that seats two thousand. Young Cubans told me excitedly of growing spiritual interest everywhere they go. They go door-to-door inviting people to join home worship groups.

Things have not always been this way. In 1962, Castro’s government closed four hundred Catholic schools because their “dangerous” beliefs were spreading. Church leaders were sent to re-education and work camps, where many died. Until 1991, Christians, especially church leaders, were overtly persecuted. Professing faith in public usually........

[bopdowah]

Castro is on the way out - for sure.

[bopdowah]

Castro is on the way out - for sure.

[LibFreeUSA]

Change will only come when both Castros are below room temp. It’s nice to hear what you say, but that is the sad truth. There is no possible way other than their departure from the face of Cuba!

[The Great RJ]

The Castro brothers are allowing these little tastes of freedom just to relieve the political pressure that could easily lead to another revolution and their ouster. Make no mistake Cuba is still a brutal communist dictatorship and always will be until the Castros are overthrown.

[Eric in the Ozarks]

The Castros built the “Committee for the Preservation of the Revolution,” modeled after the snitch system in East Germany.
It will take decades for Cubans to be completely free of Fidel and friends.

[lowbridge]

After watching him outlive so many US presidents, ill believe it when I see it.

[kabumpo]

And even then, the evil won’t be over. The Cuban people have been corrupted for generations. It’s not the land of Oz, where Dorothy’s house can fall on top of the wicked witch, and then everyone is free.

[fungoking]

Traveled there on a religious visa this summer for a mission trip. The Church is growing like crazy, VERY high ranking and connected people in government are converting. In Havana things operate with less interference from the government, out in the country side it will depend on where you are. Like some places here are more liberal or conservative it is the same there. No one bothered us in Havana but in one of the small towns we were followed and church services videotaped.

The author is right there will be change...soon.

[hoosierham]

WE do have Poland and other such nations as an example of what happens once the Communists lose power.

[Eric in the Ozarks]

There is that...