Cuba’s Communist Party has reportedly banned Christians from celebrating traditional Catholic Holy Week processions in several parts of the country ahead of Easter, including those held on Good Friday.
Catholics observe Holy Week each year to commemorate the passion, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Being a traveling event, Holy Week 2024 begins on Palm Sunday, March 24th, and ends on Easter Sunday, March 31st.
Initial reports said the Castro government had limited the ban to the Bayamo Manzanillo parish in eastern Cuba, where hundreds of people took to the streets in mid-March to protest. peacefully We demand freedom and oppose the inhumane conditions imposed by communism. Catholics, including priests and nuns, have prominently led opposition organizations in this country.
ACI PlensaCatholic News Agency Spanish Department; report On Wednesday, it announced the ban had been extended to other Cuban cities, including the capital Havana. A local source, who requested anonymity for fear of repercussions from the Castro regime, said: Said ACI Plensa The ban appears to have been implemented out of fear of new protests like those seen in Bayamo and Santiago de Cuba.
Fray Lester Zayas, a priest at Sacred Heart of Jesus Parish in the El Vedado neighborhood of Havana, said: condemned Castro’s government revealed that it had prohibited dioceses from holding the Procession of Holy Burial, a religious parade of penitence held on the afternoon of Good Friday that celebrates the burial of Jesus Christ after his death on the Holy Cross.
the fight has spoken ACI Plensa He called the denial of permission for the procession a “punishment” for his comments against the communist regime and denounced the ban as a violation of religious freedom for Cuba’s Catholics.
“It seems that the refusal has something to do with my personal matters. Apparently, my sermons make some people uncomfortable or nervous,” Fray Zayas said.
“In all the years I have been in the priesthood, I have never once used a public space, for example during a procession, to promote anything other than piety,” he continued. “I am very conscious of being the biggest defender of public space and the secular state, to know how to distinguish between public spaces that provide one kind of therapy and religious spaces that provide another therapy. .”
Anonymous Catholic Source Said Independent news outlet Cubanet In Bayamo, where a peaceful protest took place, a representative of the Religious Affairs Caution of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Cuba announced a ban on processions.
This office was created by the Castro regime in 1985 to control Cuba’s religious and fraternal organizations. All such organizations must apply for permission from the Religious Affairs Office to hold processions and other activities.
“They didn’t give an explanation, never did. They just say yes or no,” the source said.
“The government fears this procession will be an excuse to resume protests. They are trying to avoid agglomeration,” the source added.
Catholic processions and activities prohibited in Bayamo included Palm Sunday festivities.of Via Crucis (Stay of the Cross), a traditional Catholic procession during Holy Week commemorating Jesus Christ’s last day on earth before his resurrection. and the Holy Burial Procession.
Prisoners Defenders, a Spanish-based human rights NGO, denounced the ban on Catholic processions as evidence of the lack of religious freedom in Cuba.
El Regimen De #Cuba is prohibited. #bayamo
Cuba will restore religious freedom. Five Duties of India (Relatorías y Grupos de Trabajo) @ONU_esthe ultimate solution @Europarl_EN y organic como @USCIRF.
+ Information: https://t.co/JRBZdGPXiE— Prisoners Defenders (@PrisonersDFNdrs) March 25, 2024
The message read:
Cuba has overwhelmingly suppressed religious freedom. This is demonstrated by the latest resolutions of organizations such as her five mandates at the United Nations (Rapporteur System and Working Group), the European Parliament and the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom.
The Cuban Observatory for Human Rights (OCDH), a non-governmental organization, condemned On Wednesday, the Castro regime announced that it had committed at least 936 acts against the free exercise of religion in Cuba during 2023.
OCDH, towards 2023 report A survey on religious freedom in Cuba found that 68 percent of Cuban men and women interviewed knew someone who had been harassed, repressed, threatened, or disrupted in their daily lives by the Castro regime for reasons related to their faith. There was found.
Christian K. Caruso is a Venezuelan writer who chronicles life under socialism. You can follow him on Twitter here.
