Hats off to the patron saint and the ‘ferry’ godfather of normalization
WASHINGTON, D.C. – The Vatican has offered little explanation for this Sunday’s meeting between President Raul Castro and Pope Francis, apart from Vatican spokesman Federico Lombardi‘s comment that it was “strictly private,” and not an official state visit.
Indeed, the first reports were about its timing — four months before the Pontiff is to visit Cuba — not the context.
Yet, comments by the Vatican Secretary of State, Cardinal Pietro Parolin, reported by Vatican Insider last month, made clear that when Pope Francis touches down in Havana ahead of his September visit to the United States, his guiding purpose would be as much political as pastoral, to advance the normalization of relations between Cuba and the United States.
“Clearly this process is only in the early stages, and remains fragile since after so many years of uncommunicativeness and incomprehension it is not easy to walk into a climate of trust and mutual understanding, which is the very foundation for diplomatic progress,” Parolin said. “The Pope’s visit is with the intention of encouraging this process, and to urge them not to be afraid of what it could involve.”
As the Wall Street Journal reported last December, “papal diplomacy was a key to the Obama administration’s push over the past 18 months to overturn half a century of U.S. policies built around shunning Cuba.”
The Pope had stellar qualifications to serve in this role.
As a Cardinal, Pope Francis accompanied Pope John Paul II on his historic visit to Cuba in 1998. He wrote following that trip, “The motives which led the United States to impose the embargo have been entirely superseded in the present time.”
Tim Padgett, in an analysis published earlier this year, ascribed interests to Pope Francis, an Argentine, that “stem from both his papacy’s emphasis on aiding the poor and his portfolio as the first Latin American pontiff.”
Cubans appear to sense and support the Pope for his investment in the process. As the Washington Post reported, eighty percent of 1,200 Cubans surveyed by Univision Noticias and Fusion Networks gave Francis a positive rating, an impressive result in a state with meager weekly church attendance.
The White House took to Twitter to signal President Obama’s support for the Papal visit. “President Obama is pleased that His Holiness Pope Francis will visit Cuba on his way to the US later this year,” tweeted Deputy National Security Adviser Ben Rhodes.
The visit by President Castro to the Vatican, along with Cuba’s decision to welcome the Pope for his visit in September, signal ongoing support for what he has done and continues to do to support the normalization process.
This would be a very good time for the Senate Foreign Relations Committee to approve a resolution introduced by Senator Richard Durbin (IL), cosponsored by Ranking Minority Member Ben Cardin (MD), which commends Pope Francis for his leadership in securing the release of Alan Gross and for working with Cuba and the United States to achieve a more positive relationship. It has awaited action by the Committee since January.
If Pope Francis is the patron saint of normalization, than certainly President Obama is its “ferry Godfather.”
This week, the administration offered regulatory approval for American operators seeking to reinstate ferry service to and from Cuba for the first time since such travel was barred by the U.S. embargo.
In the intervening decades, air charters have been the only means of conveyance for Cuban Americans and others to visit Cuba on trips licensed by the federal government. As we’re reminded in this poignant story, refugees leaving the island braved the seas by themselves. While charters play an essential role, reinstating ferry service has profound economic implications.
As John Hay lucidly explains:
“Existing charter flights run at least $400 per round trip, and baggage overages for those bringing goods back to Cuba bump up the price substantially. The ferries promise to reduce those costs, increase transit regularity and scale, and build a 200-plus-pound-per-person cargo capacity into ticket prices. This could make the ferry lines functionally the largest everyday development in normalization to date.”
Bruce Nierenberg, president of United Caribbean Lines, sees an even broader impact. As he explained to Newsweek, “We are approaching the project not just as a ferry operation but as a new, important economic driver for both countries, and development of a ferry system for the Caribbean.”
Despite the President and the Pope’s divine intervention, two policymakers in the U.S. Congress remain unpersuaded. Rep. Mario Diaz-Balart, as we reported last week, has written restrictions into a Department of Transportation budget bill to stop the ferry service from ever leaving port.
And, if there’s a Spanish equivalent for the word “Chutzpah,” that would be an apt characterization of Senator Bob Menendez’s remarks, in which he told his erstwhile nemesis, The Daily Caller, “It’s hard to believe that ferry service which is more of a commute is going to actually promote purposeful travel which is still the law of the land versus tourism.”
He’s a U.S. Senator, after all, so he must know the law.
(From Cuba Central)
