HAVANA — Pope Francis hailed detente between the United States and Cuba as a model of reconciliation for the world, urging Presidents Barack Obama and Raul Castro to persevere in building normal ties as the pontiff launched a 10-day tour of the former Cold War foes Saturday.
Francis’ surprisingly direct call for progress toward normalization came after weeks of Vatican assurances that he would not explicitly address politics during his pastoral trip to Cuba and the U.S. He served as mediator and guarantor of 18 months of secret negotiations that led to the resumption of diplomatic relations between the two countries this year.
“For some months now, we have witnessed an event which fills us with hope: the process of normalizing relations between two peoples following years of estrangement,” the pope said in a speech on the tarmac of Jose Marti International Airport.
“I urge political leaders to persevere on this path and to develop all its potentialities as a proof of the high service which they are called to carry out on behalf of the peace and well-being of their peoples, of all America, and as an example of reconciliation for the entire world.”
Francis extended his greetings to Raul’s brother Fidel, with whom the pontiff is expected to meet as early as Sunday. He also said he wanted his greeting “to embrace especially all those who, for various reasons, I will not be able to meet” — a possible nod to political dissidents as well as ordinary Cubans across the island.
In a lengthy speech welcoming the pope, Raul Castro praised Francis’ critiques of the global economic system, saying it has “globalized capital and turned money into its idol,” and thanked the pope for mediating negotiations on detente between the United States and Cuba.
Like the last two popes to visit Cuba, Francis has no meetings with dissidents on his official schedule and his speeches here are being closely watched for their handling of two delicate and related topics: human rights in Cuba and the church’s freedom to operate in the officially agnostic, communist state.
Francis didn’t explicitly mention human rights in his speech but said he would pray to Cuba’s patron saint, the Virgin of Charity of El Cobre, “for all her Cuban children and for this beloved nation, that it may travel the paths of justice, peace, liberty and reconciliation.”
While he made no reference to the church’s desire to be allowed to operate religious schools and broadcast on state-run television and radio, he said his trip was to help the church “support and encourage the Cuban people in its hopes and concerns, with the freedom, the means and the space needed to bring the proclamation of the Kingdom to the existential peripheries of society.”
Antonio Rodiles, leader of the relatively hardline dissident group Estado de SATS, said he had been invited by the office of the papal ambassador to Cuba to wait outside the envoy’s residence for the pope’s arrival. Rodiles said he declined when informed there would be no private meeting with the pope. On previous trips, Francis has left his residences to greet the crowd outside. Cuban dissidents have complained the pope scheduled no meeting with them during his Havana visit.
A spokesman for the Cuban Conference of Catholic Bishops did not immediately return a phone call seeking confirmation of Rodiles’ comments.
Francis arrived at the Vatican envoy’s residence to a euphoric welcome following a trip from the city’s international airport in the popemobile.
“Here he comes! Here he comes!” shouted hundreds of people waiting outside the residence as Francis approached.
On his arrival, people shouted: “Francis! Brother, now you are a Cuban!”
Francis was due to rest for the remainder of the day ahead of his first big Mass on Sunday in Havana’s Revolution Square, an official meeting with the Cuban president, a vespers service and his first encounter with Cuba’s young people.
The papal spokesman, Monsignor Federico Lombardi, said there were more than 100,000 people lining Francis’ route from the airport.
The Cuban government pursued a citywide effort to bring crowds into the streets, offering a day’s pay, snacks and transportation to state workers to gather along the pope’s route. University students were also recruited to turn out.
Francis is the third pontiff to visit Cuba in 17 years — a remarkable record for any country, much less one with such a small observantly Catholic community.
He will travel to the eastern Cuban city of Santiago to pray at the sanctuary of Cuba’s patron saint and stop in the city of Holguin en route, demonstrating once again his desire to visit the places that often get overlooked.
After flying from Cuba to the U.S. on Tuesday he will, like his predecessors, grab the world stage at the United Nations to press his agenda on migration, the environment and religious persecution.
Elsewhere in the U.S., Francis will be delivering the message that Hispanics are the bedrock of the American church.
The 78-year-old Argentine Jesuit has high popularity ratings in the U.S., but he also has gained detractors, particularly among conservatives over what he calls the excesses of capitalism.
That has endeared him to Raul Castro, who vowed earlier this year that if Francis kept it up, he would return to the Catholic Church.
Still, Francis has been on record criticizing Cuba’s communist — and for decades atheist — revolution as denying individuals their “transcendent dignity.”
The pope is widely revered in Cuba for mediating the move toward better relations with the U.S.
“This visit is like a breath of hope blowing over Cuba, more than anything because of the role that the pope played in the reestablishment of relations,” said Diego Carrera, a retired state worker in Havana.
The Vatican secretary of state, Cardinal Pietro Parolin, said the Holy See hopes the rapprochement will soon be followed by the removal of the U.S. embargo, which the Vatican has long opposed. On Friday, the United States eased rules for U.S. citizens wishing to travel to Cuba and simplified procedures for telephone and Internet investments and money transfers to Cuba.
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