Mission houses, for years a reference point for Cuban Catholics

2010-11-06
AMERICA/CUBA

"Mission houses", for years a reference point for Cuban Catholics

Havana (Agenzia Fides) – For 50 years, no Catholic churches have been
built in Cuba and this has prompted the faithful to gather in private
homes or "mission houses", where there are communities that celebrate
the sacraments and the Mass regularly. Thus is what the Bishop of
Holguín (eastern Cuba), Bishop Emilio Aranguren Echeverria, saud in an
interview with a Mexican newspaper. The "mission houses" are one of the
strong points of the Church, according to the Global Pastoral Plan
2006-2010 of the Conference of Catholic Bishops of Cuba (COCC).
"We are here like in the days of the Acts of the Apostles," said Bishop
Aranguren. "The mission house is not known for its patron saint, but by
the person who hosts." Until 1997, the Catholic Church had 123 churches
that were occupied by the authorities, who have returned "a few dozen in
the last ten years," reported "Palabra Nueva", the magazine of the
Archdiocese of Havana, last April.
The "mission houses" began to operate in the 80's, remembers Bishop
Aranguren, who is also chairman of the Justice and Peace Commission of
the COCC. "They started to gain significant strength in 1993 and 1994.
In Santiago de Cuba, for example, the Archbishop erected a parish in a
mission house. There are mission houses that have more faithful than the
churches. They are attended by missionaries, pastoral workers, which may
not always be priests or religious."
After the clash with the government in the 60s, the Catholic community
spent decades in silence and discrimination and began to be revived in
the mid 80s. Bishop Aranguren studied with the Marist Fathers, devoted
to education, who had a strong presence in Cuba until 1961, when they
left. The congregation only returned to the island 40 years later.
May 2011 will mark the 50th anniversary of the abolition of Catholic
schools in Cuba by the government. The Church is not thinking of
restoring the system, but does not exclude religious education, said the
bishop. "If there is a teacher who is Catholic, we don't see why he
should hide his involvement, his commitment, his faith, in order to be
an educator. A Catholic parent has every right to be able offer his son
the faith he professes and wants his son to be educated in. I think we
are making steps forward in understanding this concept."
In Comprehensive Plan, the Church has decided to look for "new
opportunities present within society" among the poor in remote rural
areas, among families of detainees, single mothers with children of
divorced parents, abandoned elderly people, and young people "who were
born and grew up during the long years of structural atheism." (CE)
(Agenzia Fides 06/11/2010)

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