A poll published on Tuesday by the Cuban Observatory for Human Rights found that 60 percent of those who described themselves as adhering to a religion in Cuba considered discussing it in any way a “risk” due to Communist Party repression of faith.
The same poll found that a whopping 67 percent of respondents, regardless of their personal faith, have either personally experienced or known someone who has “been harassed, repressed, threatened, or hindered in their daily life for reasons related to their faith.”
The Cuban Observatory for Human Rights is an NGO that tracks political repression on the island, documenting the arrests of perceived political dissidents and Communist Party attacks on pro-democracy voices.
Cuba has been ruled by an explicitly atheist communist dictatorship since 1959 and has routinely persecuted people of faith, historically targeting Jehovah’s Witnesses and Seventh-Day Adventists most harshly. More recently, Catholic clergy, members of Evangelical Christian faiths, and followers of the Nigerian-origin Yoruba religion commonly known as santería have faced violent police actions for participating in calls for an end to the regime.
Priests, in particular, throughout the island had called for protests and other acts of defiance against communism in the months preceding the July 11, 2021, nationwide protests, which flooded nearly every municipality on the island and attracted an estimated 187,000 people.
According to the Cuban Observatory — despite decades of atheist propaganda from the government — just under half of Cubans told the organization in its study that they professed a religion. The polling found that younger people – the 18-30 and 31-45 demographics – were more likely to have religious beliefs than older generations.
“Just over 60% of people who profess a religious faith consider it a risk to discuss matters related to faith in written forms, such as blogs or Facebook,” the Observatory reported, “as well as talking about their faith with people who are not family members or meeting with other religious people.”
Among the general population, 41 percent believe that the regime especially targeted religious leaders during the July protest crackdowns due to their religious beliefs, not necessarily their political views.
“Most people perceive that there are broad impediments for the use of the media by churches, religious organizations, institutions, or groups to present their faith,” the organization also noted. “The most generalized opinion in this sense is that of religious people, where 56% state that the use of, for example, ‘radio, television, Internet’ has been impeded. 36% of interviewees consider that ‘a lot’ is impeded.”
The July protests led to a wave of national violent repression that featured door-to-door raids and beatings of individuals in their homes suspected of having partaken in the event. Many of those dragged out of their homes and imprisoned were children who have subsequently been processed in mass trials with adults. In March, the Castro regime sentenced three children to over a decade in prison – two 16-year-olds to ten years in prison and one 17-year-old to 19 years in prison – for alleged crimes associated with the protest such as “public disturbances” and “sedition.”
On Wednesday, the NGO Cuban Prisoners Defenders confirmed that it had authenticated 1,236 cases of political prisoners in Cuba, warning that the true number is significantly larger and the confirmed cases are only those that the regime allows to be verified from abroad.
Following the July protests – and the violent crackdowns on spiritual leaders in the following days – nuns and priests organized the largest national protests against the regime since the summer in November.
Among the leaders still in prison today after the July 2021 repression is Loreto Hernández García, a senior leader of the Association of Free Yorubas of Cuba, who was hospitalized last month after suffering a heart attack in prison. His family has repeatedly demanded the Cuban regime free him or at least offer adequate medical attention, with no response from the government.
Open Doors, a global aid organization that tracks Christian persecution, ranked Cuba number 27 on its 2022 “World Watch List” of countries where it is most difficult to openly identify as Christian. Cuba was ranked number 61 in 2020 and number 51 in 2021, which the group noted was an indication of rapidly rising state-administered persecution “against churches deemed to be opponents of the regime — especially non-registered Protestant churches.”
“The COVID-19 [Chinese coronavirus] crisis has been used as a pretext to hinder church and community activities, monitor church leaders, make arbitrary arrests, confiscate private property and impose extortion fees,” the group also observed. “Christian leaders from different denominations were among those arrested during anti-government demonstrations in July.”
“The government reacts harshly against opposition voices and demonstrators, and so when church leaders or Christian activists criticize the regime, they face arrest, closure of their churches or businesses, prison sentences, and harassment by the government and its sympathizers,” it concluded.