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Pope John Paul II prepares to celebrate Mass in Plaza Antonio Maceo in Santiago de Cuba, Jan. 24, 1998. (Reuters Photo)

On the eve of the pope's Jan. 21, 1998, visit, Cuban Catholics pray in El Templete Church in Old Havana. (AFP Photo)

By Aileen S. Yoo
Washingtonpost.com Staff
Updated December 1998

Pope John Paul II became the first pontiff to visit Cuba in January 1998. At an open-air Mass in Santa Clara, he condemned abortion and the high rate of divorce in Cuba and chastised the Cuban government's long-standing ban on Catholic education. The visit, unimaginable in the early days of the revolution, capped nearly four decades of tension between church and state.

From the time the Spaniards introduced Catholicism, the church's power in Cuba was relatively weak. A centralized institution, the church had Spanish priests or Cuban priests from upper-class backgrounds, who catered to elite whites in urban areas rather than to the masses. As political tumult gripped Cuba in the 1950s, the support of church members was divided between dictator Fulgencio Batista and Fidel Castro. Some members supporting Castro became active in his rebellion known as the 26th of July Movement.

Many hoped that Castro's new government would signal a new era of cooperation with the church. Educated in a Jesuit high school, he acknowledged when he took power in January 1959 that the church had provided assistance and helped with revolution efforts. But the following year, the church formally denounced Castro's rule in a pastoral letter read aloud at all services. Another pastoral letter shortly followed, asking Castro to reject communism. Many priests were expelled as a result of the Vatican's opposition to the revolution. Relations quickly deteriorated in 1961 when three priests of the Havana-based Agrupacion Catolica joined in the anti-Castro Bay of Pigs invasion and thousands participated in a religious procession protesting the new regime. The government responded by expelling priests, eliminating religious holidays, prohibiting religious processions and restricting church groups' use of mass media. On July 6, 1961, Cuba enacted the Law on the Nationalization of Education that nationalized all schools and banned religious education from the curriculum.

On paper, the 1976 constitution declared that Cubans were free to practice religion. In practice, the basic principles of Marxist-Leninist ideology restricted religious activity, forcing the church to hold limited social activities and barring the faithful from Communist Party membership and, as a result, higher offices.

Tensions slowly eased over the next 30 years. State radio and television were broadcasting religious music and scriptures in 1990. Two years later, a constitutional revision prohibited religious discrimination and declared Cuba a "secular" rather than an atheist state. In an effort to attract more members, the Communist Party also lifted its 25-year policy of barring church members from party membership. In 1996, the pope welcomed Castro to the Vatican and accepted an invitation to visit Cuba in January 1998. Eleven months after the pope's visit, the Cuban government reinstated Christmas as a permanent holiday.

Today, the Roman Catholic Church has little influence in Cuba but remains the largest organized religion. Other Christians include Anglicans, Methodists, Baptists and Presbyterians; and a Jewish community of about 1,300 lives in Havana.

Many Cubans practice Santeria, a mixture of African spiritual beliefs and Catholic saint worship -- one of many African-based religions practiced by black slaves when Cuba was a Spanish colony. Other Afro-Cuban religions include Palo Monte, based in black magic and originating from the Bantu people of what is now Angola, Voodoo and Abakua.