Interesting stuff (in English and Spanish) about fidel’s demise.
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/15203811.htm
Does Cuban legend predict Castro’s demise?
An obscure Cuban legend predicts that a young bearded leader will die during the fourth decade of his rule.
BY LUISA YANEZ
lyanez@MiamiHerald.comNews of Fidel Castro’s illness has renewed interest in an obscure legend involving Cuba’s patron saint and her prediction to a priest 150 years ago that one day Cubans would be enslaved by a bearded young leader — who then dies during the fourth decade of his reign.
This week, stories about the prediction have been making the rounds on the Internet — with some variations.
”So far, everything that it predicts has happened,” said a church worker at La Ermita de la Caridad chapel in Coconut Grove who was asked Friday about the veracity of the story.
The woman, who would not give her name, said she had heard of the tale years ago, but more so this week when she had received e-mails about the legend. ”A lot of people are taking about it,” she said.
The legend, with some variations, begins in the 1850s and goes something like this:
A Spanish priest, San Antonio María Claret, had been sent to Cuba to become archbishop of Santiago de Cuba, coincidentally Castro’s home province. One day, while riding his horse through the province’s majestic Sierra Maestra — also coincidentally Castro’s mountainous rebel stronghold in the mid-1950s — La Virgen de la Caridad del Cobre appeared to him in a vision, he later told his congregation.
She relayed to him the future of Cuba in the hands of a leader that resembled Castro, but years before his birth in 1926, he said. He will have long hair, a beard, wear a uniform and carry weapons. He’ll have followers, who will look just like him.
Claret claimed the virgin told him the young man would spend a short time committing acts that would violate God’s commandments. There would be turmoil and the spilling of blood. This could be interpreted as the 1959 overthrow by the rebel leader of Cuban dictator Fulgencio Batista.
He would promise reforms to the Cuban people, who would welcome him with great love and fervor. But he would eventually betray, imprison and divide them and inflict them with great pain and heartache.
Claret said the virgin told him the young man would rule for four decades, and Cuba would be devastated during this period. In time, the young man would grow old. He would die and then the skies would become clear and blue over Cuba, freeing it it from the darkness that entrapped it.
Again, there would be a period of instability before Cuba would recover and flourish again.
And what happened to the young priest? He left Cuba in 1857 and went back to Spain to become a personal confessor for his queen.
http://www.aciprensa.com
LA HABANA, 01 Ago. 06 (ACI).- El anuncio oficial de que el líder cubano Fidel Castro de 79 años ha tenido que ceder poderes a su hermano Raúl (de 75 años) para ser operado de una hemorragia intestinal ha puesto nuevamente en el tapete las profecías de San Antonio María Claret, quien profetizó a mediados del siglo XIX que Cuba se insertará en el concierto de naciones luego de la muerte de Fidel Castro “en cama” y un breve periodo de violencia interna.
El santo español fue Arzobispo de Cuba entre 1851 y 1857. De acuerdo a una fuerte tradición oral y a escritos que conserva la congregación que fundó, la Virgen de la Caridad del Cobre reveló a San Antonio, mientras recorría las montañas de Santiago de Cuba, que la Isla sufriría una dictadura de más de 40 años, que terminarán con la muerte del líder (Castro) en su cama y el “derramamiento de sangre”.
Las palabras de San Antonio se han convertido en una leyenda de transmisión oral que ha pasado de generación en generación y que ahora se han hecho presentes a raíz de la condición física de Castro, que cumplirá 80 años este mes.
Según un comunicado escrito por el propio Castro y leído por su jefe de despacho, Carlos Valenciaga, Castro está siendo intervenido de una hemorragia intestinal que le sobrevino por el “enorme esfuerzo” realizado durante su reciente visita a Argentina para participar en la Cumbre de Mercosur y su intervención en los actos por el aniversario del asalto al cuartel Moncada tras su vuelta a La Habana.
La operación, continúa el texto, “me obliga a permanecer varias semanas de reposo alejado de mi responsabilidades y cargos”.
Claret y la profecía
San Antonio María Claret nació en 1807, en Cataluña. En 1851, partió rumbo a Cuba con el encargo de ser Arzobispo de Santiago. Llegó el 18 de febrero de ese año y consagró su actividad pastoral a la protección de la Virgen de la Caridad del Cobre, patrona de todos los cubanos, de quien también fue un entusiasta devoto.
Según la tradición, el Padre Claret estaba recorriendo las zonas montañosas de Santiago cuando se le presentó la Virgen de la Caridad para predecirle el futuro de Cuba, profecía que luego el sacerdote transmitió a sus feligreses y miembros de su congregación.
La revelación de la Virgen “hablaba de un joven muy osado (NDR, Castro) que subiría por esas mismas montañas con las armas en la mano, y después de unos años bajaría triunfante con una espesa barba, acompañado de otros hombres también barbudos y con largos cabellos”.
“Esos jóvenes traerían, colgando de sus cuellos, medallas de la Caridad del Cobre y crucifijos que en poco tiempo dejarían de usar, para luego negar con vergüenza sus creencias”.
La profecía agrega que el joven líder “sería aclamado por todos a causa de numerosas reformas de beneficio popular, se iría apoderando poco a poco de todo el poder, sumiendo al pueblo cubano bajo una férrea dictadura que duraría 40 años, en los cuales Cuba sufriría numerosas calamidades y penurias. Finalmente, ese hombre moriría en la cama”.
Tras su fallecimiento, continúa la profecía, “se produciría un corto período de inestabilidad y enfrentamientos, en los que incluso llegarían a producirse algunos derramamientos de sangre, aunque luego la nación cubana volvería a levantarse poco a poco hasta llegar a ocupar un destacado lugar en el ámbito internacional”.
El 22 febrero de 1857, San Antonio María Claret partió de regreso a España al ser nombrado confesor de la Reina. Fue despedido por una multitud en el puerto de Santiago de Cuba.
El gobierno cubano guarda absoluto sigilo sobre el resultado de la operación y el proceso de recuperación de Castro.
I’m staying away from this one. I just assume not depend on witchcraft and superstition for the freedom of Cuba. That is the peak of desperation.
I agree Pototo–once Ochun and Yemaya get involved, it’s all downhill from there. Next, they’ll be predicting Iraq will be a democracy!
I agree Pototo–once Ochun and Yemaya get involved, it’s all downhill from there. Next, they’ll be predicting Iraq will be a democracy!
when in doubt, elegua will show you the way.. this story was pretty well reported in the brasilian media back when the story was hot and heavy, but i was too bust to translate and forwarded a babelfish translation.. and by the stats im getting, alot of people are doing a web search on this..
I think it’s cool.
Cuba is a mystical place. My favorite Cuban mysticism is one that Val shared with us – when our pets die, some long chronic problem will go away. When my precious Willy The Kitty died, after 23 precious years, I got a job offer in the same seconds after she died on my lap. I had been unemployed for years and it was an awesome wonderful job. I can’t help but think there was some relationship, it was an incredible coincidence.
Please note that this prophesy was given through a saint of the Catholic Church, San Antonio María Claret, considered by many catholics as The Cuban Saint; not by any “fortune teller” or by “Ochun and Yemaya” as someone expressed in a typical preyorative way.
When I first read this a few weeks ago my first question was “Is this some type of ‘urban legend”? This seems a bit too convenient / weird to me… Just a question! 🙂
yo no creo en nada de nada…y menos en profesias…si hasta el cuento del Nostradamus (sp) es fake!!!!
Something that seems inconsistent to me is this line of the prophecy: “Cuba entregará la soberanÃa y la independencia por la que hoy se lucha” which would suggest that Claret was a supporter of Cuban sovereignty from Spain…which would make him an unlikely confessor to the Queen of Spain, as he later became. I love the idea of Cuba becoming a vibrant, democratic society after Castro’s entry into history, which hopefully is upon us. But this prophecy seems inconsistent, too convenient, and too good to be true. I hope I’m wrong.
Somehow my quote got mangled between Preview and Post…Val, does this blog not accept Spanish language characters?!!!!!
To us protestants saint/superstitions potatoe/potatoe (or is is pototo). And quit using $5 words on my nickel mind. Wasn’t meant as a jab at you. I personally can’t line up catholic saints with the Bible, but thats for another thread.
Pototo, you’re a heretic! 😉
Hey George,
I resemble that remark.
George,
Just got off your site. “political homosexuality” That is a CLASSIC. I love it. The quote that is.
Can anyone name a prophecy that did not come true?
Jeez, I don’t remember writing that. What article?
Sorry George,
I got it off therealcuba.com. I thought you had that site.
That’s my tocayo Jorge that runs TheRealCuba.com.
Not to mention…didn’t the fourth decade of castro’s rule end in 1999?
My father told me about this a few years back. Interesting…..
I don’t believe that prophecy either. I believe that it was right after the fall of the Soviet Empire and the Berlin Wall or sometime there about that hopeful Cuban Americans started circulating that prophecy. It came out in el Diario Las Americas and other Cuban American venues if I remember correctly. Everyone was desperately waiting for Castro to fall and they latched on to that prophecy out of sheer desperation. Nothing happened. Now that there is a chance that the monstrosity will die, people are again dragging it out. I guess that if one tries hard enough, one can find consistencies in any prophecy [classic example is Nostrodamus] but that doesn’t mean that it is true.
Anyway, after Jaime Ortega’s command that the Cuban people pray for Castro’s well-being, I’m a little hesistant to believe anything that comes out of the church.
Apparently some in the Church question the authenticity of this prophecy as well:
http://www.vozcatolica.org/65/claret_obispo.htm
Be that as it may, the important thing is the sonomambich is terminally ill and, like W. C Fields, is no doubt “looking for loopholes, looking for loopholes.” He can look forward to a nice, dark hole.