Gospel according to Lucius

El Papa visits, so the house organ of the officially atheistic Communist Party of Cuba (Granma) offers paeans to one of its Fidelators;

Cubans fondly remember the legacy of U.S. Reverend Lucius Walker, founder of the solidarity movement, Pastors for Peace, and a dear friend of the Revolution.

Born in New Jersey on August 3, 1930, he graduated from Shaw University in Raleigh (North Carolina) in 1954. The pastor of the Salvation Baptist Church toured hundreds of cities defying the laws of his country to bring tons of products to the island, scarce during the nineties due to the tightening of the unjust U.S. economic, commercial and financial blockade and the fall of the socialist camp.

His life was marked by the struggle for racial equality and civil rights led by the Reverend Martin Luther King. He built bridges between the peoples of the world, defending justice, social progress and the liberation struggles of developing countries against the hegemony of the United States.

Which, as all the world knows, was the only place to get food, clothing, automobiles and their spare parts, cell phones, TV sets, computers....?

Lucius Walker died on September 7, 2011. His ashes rest in Havana, fulfilling his last wish. He professed great affection for the leader of the Revolution, Fidel Castro, and an outpouring of love for the Cuban people.

Among other triumphs, Pastor Lucius helped save little Elián from living in freedom with his Cuban relatives (with whom his mother died trying to reunite themselves)

Following the imprisonment of the Five Cuban anti-terrorists, he put all his efforts into securing the release of Gerardo Hernández, Ramón Labañino, Antonio Guerrero, Fernando González and René González, as he had done previously in the battle for the return of Elián González, kidnapped in 1999 by the anti-Cuban mafia in Miami, after the vessel in which he was traveling with his mother capsized in the Florida Straits.

We admire the propagandist who came up with that that we bolded above. True professionalism.

Cubans remember Reverend Lucius Walker as a man of ideas, who put his humanist, scientific, philosophical and political thought at the service of humanity. A plaque recalling the selfless work of this great figure, committed to solidarity and peace, can be found at the José Martí Anti-Imperialist Tribune, located opposite the U.S. Embassy in Havana.

No doubt Pope Francis will celebrate a Mass there before his visit ends.