Article by Steve Fainaro, Boston Globe Staff
January 26, 1998

HAVANA - Pope John Paul II preached the word of God yesterday to hundreds of thousands of people gathered inside the Plaza of the Revolution, transforming the sacred ground of Cuban socialism into a forum for free expression neither seen nor heard here in four decades.

As John Paul expanded his withering critique of a society stripped of religion, Cubans jammed shoulder-to-shoulder roared in approval and shook their heads in disbelief. They laughed, embraced, and chanted ''Viva El Papa!'' for a pope credited with destabilizing Communism in Eastern Europe.

The estimated turnout for the final Mass of the five-day pilgrimage averaged about 500,000 - a sea of worshipers waving banners and tiny Cuban and Vatican flags. From within the crowd, which included President Fidel Castro, solitary cries of ''freedom'' and ''justice'' could be heard as the pope delivered his powerful homily.

''For the first time in the entire history of the revolution, another voice has been heard,'' said Lourdes Maria Alonzo, a 34-year-old psychologist. ''In this country, you can't say these things.''

Facing a 20-story image of Ernesto ''Che'' Guevara, Cuba's atheist martyr, the pope refused even to use the plaza's post-revolutionary name, referring to it instead as the Plaza of Jose Marti. ''The attainment of freedom,'' he told the crowd, ''is a duty which no one can shirk.'' He called on Christians to work toward a ''liberation'' that ''reaches its fullness in the exercise of freedom of conscience, the basis and foundation of all other human rights.''

With the crowd cheering after almost every sentence, the feeble 77-year-old pontiff said finally: ''The pope is not against applause. Applause allows the pope to rest.'' He ended his homily by turning the legacy of Jose Marti - the poet/hero of Cuban independence - against a government that has held up Marti as an icon of Marxist-Leninist ideology.

''An irreligious people will die, because nothing in it encourages virtue,'' said the pope, quoting Marti. ''Human injustices offend virtue; it is necessary that heavenly justice guarantee it.''

The pope left Cuba early yesterday evening with the biggest question hanging in the air: whether his visit can bring about long-expected political change on the island. Before last year, no public Mass had been held in Cuba in 35 years. Until 1992, Catholics were denied entry into the Communist Party, discriminated against in the workplace and held back from educational opportunities.

The pilgrimage, in which the pope pressed directly for the expansion of Catholic education, is certain to bolster interest in the rapidly expanding Cuban church. He denied that the church's motives were political.

However, many people also believe that the pope has christened the church as a refuge for independent thought and passive resistance against the Castro government. Enrique Aguilar, a 28-year-old engineer, who attended the Mass with several friends, said the pope ''has opened up the minds of every single person in Cuba. Look at me: I grew up in the revolution. I've known only one conception of the world.''

During the homily, Zoyga Garcia, a petite 65-year-old retired office worker, yelled: ''Pope, please, bring us justice!'' Afterward, she was even more pointed: ''Democracy: that's what people lack here, and make sure you write my name down. We're a repressed people, we're living in misery. I think what the pope has done is teach us how to resist.''

The pope appears to be seeking a compromise that would end the polarization between the Cuban and US governments; bring together the island with its country in exile, some 1 million Cubans living abroad; and prepare it for a ''soft landing'' during the inevitable transition when Castro, 71, finally fades away.

''Cuba needs to open herself up to the world and the world needs to draw close to Cuba,'' he said. Before his departure, he delivered his strongest criticism yet of the 35-year-old US trade embargo against the island, decrying ''oppressive economic measures - unjust and ethically unacceptable - imposed from outside the country.''

He also lashed out at capitalism ''which subordinates the human person to blind market forces and conditions the development of peoples on those forces.''

Castro emphasized his common ground with the pope as he bid him farewell, thanking him ''for every word you have said - even those I might disagree with.''

''I think we have given the world a good example,'' Castro said. ''You, by visiting what some choose to call communism's last bulwark; we by receiving the religious leader who had been imputed responsibility for the destruction of socialism in Europe. There were those who forbode apocalyptic events; some even dreamed of them.''

Standing in the rain, the pope joked to the farewell crowd: ''Is it that the people of Cuba are crying because the pope is leaving?''

The pope's most dramatic effect so far has been to expose Cubans to an authority beyond Castro. From the beginning of his visit, life here was altered. Yesterday, after walking past the ubiquitous slogans of the revolution, painted on virtually every wall, Cubans arrived at the plaza to see the immense image of Che challenged by a mural of Jesus on the facade of the National Library.

As in the three previous Masses, party sympathizers lined the periphery, but they were dwarfed by the crowd. They stood in lines, as people danced in circles, raised signs bearing images of the pope and screamed: ''Cuba always was Catholic! Cuba always was Catholic.''

Unlike previous Masses, where people talked during the homily, mingled, or simply walked away, the crowd hung on the pope's every word. People who talked were told to ''shhhhh'' by those around them. Within 1,000 yards of the stage, the plaza was packed, but many people still pushed forward, trying to get closer to the pope.

Many people, attending their first Mass, appeared confused and needed to consult a 31-page guide prepared by the church to follow along. But nearly everyone sung and prayed aloud, a mass of humanity, schooled in atheism, pledging its profession of faith:

''Do you believe in the Almighty God, creator of Heaven and Earth?'' the pope asked.

''Yes, I believe,'' the crowd said in unison.

''Do you believe in Jesus Christ, his only son, our Lord, born of the Virgin Mary, who died, was buried, was resurrected and is seated at the right hand of God?''

''Yes, I believe.''

After the Mass, a man wandered through the crowd, joyous over what he had heard. Walking past the students, who were still chanting for the pope, past the worshipers dancing in a circle in the middle of the plaza, past a family in mid-embrace, he walked up to a foreigner.

''We are living in darkness,'' he said to the stranger. ''The sunrise, it is coming very soon.''

This story ran on page A01 of the Boston Globe on 01/26/98.
© Copyright 1998 Globe Newspaper Company.