‘Worst Poverty in Cuba Is the ‘Lack of Freedom’| National Catholic Register

Father Bladimir Navarro claimed that ‘the Cuban communist dictatorship is frightened of dropping electric power. They have handed new rules to perpetuate their Marxist ideology.’

In a recent interview with the pontifical basis Support to the Church in Want, Father Bladimir Navarro, who lives in Spain, explained that “the individuals of Cuba are surviving, and the worst poverty is the absence of freedom.” He also mentioned that “the Church is a refuge of hope” for Cubans “to join with the Lord and to heal the wounds of Marxist ideology.”

Talking one particular yr soon after the historic protests of July 11, 2021, the priest observed that the situation on the island worsened right after the demonstrations, but that, right after the demonstrations, “Cuba stopped getting information.”

Father Navarro explained that “the Cuban communist dictatorship is worried of dropping electricity. They have handed new laws to perpetuate their Marxist ideology.”

The priest reported that soon after the 2021 demonstrations there had been numerous youthful people sent to jail. “Prison sentences are really lengthy — much more than 10 decades for several youthful people — some even minors, 17 many years outdated,” he reported. “They only asked, ‘We want freedom, we want life we want to stay and we don’t want to [just] endure.’”

Father Navarro that the agents of the routine “go soon after any individual who posts a photo or anything against communism on social media. Anybody who tells a little something about each day lifetime, from the bread line or some thing that has took place at their children’s faculty, is being threatened.”

“Therefore, quite a few persons have decided to go away emigration is expanding a lot,” he stated.

“People are drained of boosting their voices and staying set in jail. There are nonetheless more than 900 prisoners, just for peacefully demonstrating on [July 11, 2021], without having attacking they marched peacefully,” he said.

Father Navarro also explained that Cubans have “the require to be totally free and to have their dignity respected. The human, anthropological injury that the Cuban people today are struggling is tremendous.”

“Why do you have to be [considered] scum, a worm, an enemy to feel in different ways or imagine something different than the Cuban communist routine? At the root of almost everything is the human injury that Marxist ideology has carried out for 60 years in Cuba,” he ongoing.

“Marxism goes against the spouse and children, it’s likely to demolish the flexibility and dignity of the human currently being. It’s distress and the worst matter that is going on to Cubans ideal now,” the priest said.

Financial Condition

The priest informed Help to the Church in Have to have that in Cuba, “inflation has greater enormously. Cubans were pretty satisfied when it was declared that wages would maximize. But now the selling price of the most primary matters is pretty large you just can’t get milk, and there are no medications.”

“We are viewing that quite a few homes are falling aside all over the state, when new lodges are staying developed in Havana. If you elevate your voice and tell the real truth, they go just after you, they defame you. Jail sentences have enhanced,” he pointed out.

Father Navarro said that “the people of Cuba are going hungry and are in excellent will need. It’s extremely unfortunate to see how outdated men and women are advertising their belongings in the streets to get the minimum amount to be able to buy something to consume. Or to see the long strains at the retailers.”

“Apart from the economic misery, we are going through the distress of worry, of emigration, of the lack of values. Yet another urgent difficulty is the lack of prescription drugs you simply cannot get acetaminophen or ibuprofen, of program not antibiotics,” he added.

Given the circumstance, he described that the work of the Catholic Church is “to accompany the suffering of the persons. As Moses did with the persons of Israel, who introduced the individuals out of slavery. There are many individuals, spiritual, monks, bishops, and fully commited laity who are accompanying people who are struggling the most, offering encouragement and hope in this kind of a sad time,” he defined.

The priest reported that “help is not only product, such as the mission of Caritas Cuba or establishments these types of as Aid to the Church in Will need that are helping a great deal, it is also needed to accompany, to listen, to be by the facet of the suffering and fortify them materially and spiritually.”

Father Navarro said that “it is true that Christ is the only hope he is ‘the hope that does not disappoint.’ But things are poor, that hope has been diminishing, especially among the younger persons in dire straits [who] only see leaving the nation as a solution.”

“But Jesus has words of hope the Church with its social doctrine can carry the slipping hope of Cubans,” he claimed.

The priest questioned the faithful “to be the voice of all those who have no voice, to make known what is happening in Cuba.”

He reported, “Prayer is also essential.” 

This tale was very first released by ACI Prensa, CNA’s Spanish-language news associate. It has been translated and adapted by CNA.