Information service of the Pontifical Mission Societies since 1927
Vatican City (Agenzia Fides) - Pope Benedict XVI sent a Message to Cardinal Jaime Ortega y Alamino, archbishop of San Cristobal de La Habana and president of the Conference of Catholic Bishops of Cuba, for the occasion of the 20th anniversary of the Cuban National Ecclesial Encounter. In his Message, dated February 2, Feast of the Presentation of the Lord, the Holy Father sends affectionate greetings to the bishops, priests, consecrated people and laity of Cuba, expressing his "spiritual closeness" and "encouragement for their evangelizing tasks."
The Holy Father invites Cubans to consider human reality rich in saving events, “because time and history are filled with God’s presence which encourages and fortifies”, and he exhorts them to “discover in experience the signs and traces of the living God who walks with you … who walks with all the people who live on this earth, believers and non, near and far, those who sow and those who scatter, because all are invited to the feast of life given us by the Father”. On this anniversary, writes Benedict XVI, it would be particularly appropriate to recall the words used by John Paul II on his visit to Cuba in 1998: "May Cuba open to the world, and may the world open to Cuba." Such openness, the Pope says, "requires us first of all to consider how to open heart and understanding to the things of God; how those who coexist can open to one another, believing and trusting in each another though with different ways of thinking and believing; and finally, how to open to the world, with its challenges, its possibilities and its difficulties."
Lastly the Pope writes: "Only through the gaze of God, a loving gaze, will it be possible to arrive at the truth of each individual, of each group and of those who live together in one land. On this journey, ... much help may be gained from each Christian's experience of prayer, in the silence and humility of daily work, in faithfulness to professed faith, in the implicit or explicit announcement of the Gospel. Much help is also to be had from the love of majority of Cubans for the 'Madre de la Cardida del Cobre," patroness of this land for so long, who accompanies its inhabitants with motherly tenderness." To Mary Benedict XVI entrusts meetings for the 20th anniversary of ENEC. (S.L.) (Agenzia Fides 16/2/2006 righe 24, parole 362)
