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The Catholic Bishops Conference of Cuba (COCC) released its Christmas Message 2025, addressed to the faithful and all Cubans, in which it recalls the profound meaning of the birth of Jesus Christ and connects it with the current reality of the country, characterized by social, economic, and human challenges, but also by the need for hope, unity, and solidarity.
In the document, the bishops remind us that Christmas commemorates the birth of Jesus Christ in the midst of a humble, poor, and needy family, similar to that of many in today's world.
The bishops note that this Christmas will be especially difficult for many individuals and families, particularly for those affected by the Hurricane Melissa in eastern Cuba. They commend the solidarity that these communities have received and assure that they will continue to pray for and assist them.
"Christmas is a celebration of family," the message states, highlighting that this time provides the opportunity to gather around a table or in church.
"Let us all learn to value those who gave us life and, through effort and sacrifice, sought to make us good people! We owe them our gratitude and our commitment to help," he emphasizes.
The text also calls for opening one’s heart to Jesus Christ, starting with sincere forgiveness towards family members, neighbors, and colleagues or classmates. In particular, it urges gestures of closeness towards those who are alone and have no one to share with.
"Let us know how to express love towards the elderly, the sick, the prisoners, and their families! Let us not walk past when we encounter someone begging or eating scraps!" he emphasizes.
In that context, the Church adds that Christmas is an invitation to brotherly embrace, dialogue, to extend a hand, and to build bridges instead of walls. It calls for forgetting offenses and resentments, and for recognizing one another as brothers in order to build a better Cuba together.
The bishops revisit their Christmas message from 2020, in which they expressed wishes that remain relevant five years later: to end the anxiety over securing food, to ensure decent jobs and wages, to prevent violence and insults, to replace intolerance with plurality and dialogue, for Cubans not to have to emigrate to live well, and for the government to promote creative initiatives, unleash productive forces, and enact laws that foster the comprehensive human development of the nation.
To these wishes, they note, others that are necessary and urgent are now being added. "That the time to make them a reality is not further delayed, with everyone's commitment," the document states.
The COCC asserts that Christian hope strengthens personal and collective commitment, especially when reflecting on the birth of Jesus Christ.
"Thanks to hope, which is Christ, each person finds answers in the face of life and death, health and illness, love and violence, frustrations and helplessness," they emphasize.
In this Jubilee Year, the bishops urge Christians and Cubans to be sowers of hope, capable of inspiring actions that contribute to the construction of a new Cuba.
They finally commend the country to the Most Holy Virgin of Charity and ask for her intercession for all.
The message concludes with a blessing, asking that the Lord accompany, defend, guide, and protect the Cuban people, and wishing for a Merry Christmas and a Blessed New Year 2026.
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