When Pope John Paul II arrived for a six-day trip to Cuba on January 21, 1998, he closed his first address to the Cuban people with a historic message: “May Cuba, with all its magnificent potential, open itself to the world, and may the world open itself up to Cuba.”
With that faith and more hope, Cuban exiles gathered July 13 for Mass at the National Shrine of Our Lady of Charity in Miami to pray for freedom in their homeland, two days after unusual and unexpected protests broke out in different cities on the island.
