Pope Francis Visits Cuba And Celebrates Mass Before Thousands

Pope Francis met with Cuban President Raul Castro at the Palace of the Revolution in this capital Sunday during his first official visit to the communist island, part of an global tour that will also take him to the United States.

A soundtrack ranging from Mozart to “Motownphilly” has been created by a Notre Dame professor for Pope Francis’ upcoming visit to the United States. Crowds of Cubans gathered on the sides of the road to catch a glimpse of him.

The government’s opponents may feel the pope was talking about Fidel and Raul Castro, the brothers who have been Cuba’s dominant figures since the 1959 revolution while their defenders could point to another passage as praise for a revolution that has provided Cubans with free health care and education.

Those four had attempted to deliver a letter to the pope, one of whom got close enough to make contact with Francis in his popemobile, UNPACU leader Jose Daniel Ferrer said.

Pope Francis, who has been credited with assisting in a thaw in U.S.-Cuban relations, is scheduled to begin his trip to the United States on Tuesday.

The pope wrote a personal appeal to Presidents Barack Obama and Raul Castro and hosted their delegations at a secret meeting at the Vatican past year to seal a deal after 18 months of closed-door negotiations.

Between 30 and 40 dissidents had been detained to stop them attending papal events, a dissident human rights group said.

“We do not have the right to allow ourselves yet another failure on this path of peace and reconciliation”, Francis concluded his Mass.

Flanked by a portrait of his fellow Argentine, Cuban guerrilla leader and staunch atheist Ernesto “Che” Guevara, he urged them to care for one another out of a sense of service, not ideology. Francis gave Castro some books, while the former leader gave the pope a book with a dedication inside.

As with any massive event, Pope Francis’ visit to Cuba is mostly religious despite the political undertones and role of the Vatican in bringing renewed diplomatic relations between the USA and Cuba.

“Cuba is an archipelago, facing all directions, with an extraordinary value as a key between north and south, east and west. Its natural vocation is to be a point of encounter for all peoples to join in friendship”, he said in a speech at the airport.

The Pope celebrated Mass on Sunday in Havana’s iconic Revolution Square, which marked the first time Cubans were addressed in Spanish by a Pontiff.