Cuban Catholic Church hopes Pope can visit in 2012
(June 18, 2010) The Catholic Church of Cuba is hoping that Pope Benedict XVI will
visit the nation in 2012, a bishop said on Thursday. “It’s our hope, our interest,
that the Pope comes to Cuba in the year 2012,” on the 400th anniversary of the discovery
of Cuba's patron saint, said Bishop Emilio Aranguren of Holguin. “It's up to the
Holy See,” he said. The Vatican did not comment on it. Pope John Paul II visited
Cuba visited in 1998. In 1612, a small wooden statue was found floating off the
coast of El Cobre bearing the label, “I am the Virgin of Charity.” The Virgin of
Charity was declared the patron saint of Cuba in 1916. Bishop Aranguren's comments
came at a briefing on the activities of Archbishop Dominique Mamberti, the Vatican
Secretary for Relations with States, equivalent to foreign minister, who arrived in
Havana on Tuesday to mark the Catholic Social Week and the 75th anniversary of diplomatic
relations between Cuba and the Vatican. Bishop Aranguren said the Vatican official’s
visit has nothing to do with a possible papal visit. Archbishop Mamberti will conclude
his Cuba visit on Sunday. Cuba continued diplomatic ties with the Vatican, even when
the island was officially atheist after the 1959 revolution that brought Fidel Castro
to power.