Cuban Catholics in the United States, 1960-1980: Exile and Integration

Introduction

Introduction The flight of tens of thousands of Cubans during the 1960s from a radical revolution that eventually became an orthodox Marxist state along Soviet lines produced militant nationalist communities abroad dedicated to an eventual return. These refugees followed a long tradition of political exile in Cuban history. Throughout the island’s turbulent history highly politicized populations have fled political repression but more often than not remained engaged with the destiny of their homeland. Cubans departed with strong national feelings and deep connections to their patria that influenced community and family life, institutions, and attitudes characterized by a powerful sense of exile identity. Certainly not all Cubans yearned for their homeland in the same way during all periods, but the phenomenon has been present throughout with differing degrees of intensity.1 In 1992, a wide cross-section of Cuban Catholics representing religious and laity, diverse generations, and competing political perspectives met in St. Augustine, Florida, and issued a document known as CRECED.2 Catholic leaders described themselves “as essentially exiles and not mere immigrants of an economic kind” and interpreted their overall experience as similar to the biblical Babylonian exile.3 Central to this affirmation of exile was the idea of return. “The great prophets of the exile . . . devoted a great deal of their activity to preparing for the return with programs and slogans that would help the restoration of the dispersed of Israel as the People of God returned to the promised-land.” Though the time had not yet arrived for Cubans to return home, “we would be remiss in our duty if we did not begin, right now, to prepare with prayer and concrete plans.”4 “The spiritual climate of the Babylonian exile,” they declared, “is the yearning for the fatherland, both bitter and sweet at once; together with it, as the years go by, the urgency of preparing for return is a part of that climate.”5 Any thought of return, of course, required maintaining a genuine sense of Cuban identity and nationality. “We have been in exile for over thirty years and we have not forgotten or set aside the Cuban issue,” and this should continue as a pastoral challenge; to form “men and women with a Christian outlook on life, capable of sacrificing themselves to rebuild a nation as envisioned by the Apostle of our Independence, José Martí.”6 1 These characteristics so clearly articulated in the early 1990s in fact emerged and developed during the first twenty years of exile, a period now often referred to in the Miami Cuban community as the “historical exile.” Their powerful sense of exile and desire for return, even as they established a formidable economic, political, and sociocultural presence in Florida and other states quickly defined the Cuban community in the United States. This is a story of the Cuban-born exile generation of the 1960s and 1970s: those arriving as already formed adults, young adults who completed their maturation in exile, and adolescents and children whose formation occurred outside Cuba. They all struggled over time to translate their exile and emerging ethnic realities into coherent actions that would honor their commitment to their homeland while facilitating their integration into other societies. This book explores their exile from Cuba and their integration into the United States, mostly in south Florida but also in other places, and considers the relationships between exilic and ethnic identities and the place of Cubans in the broader society. Unlike immigrants who arrived without any intention of ever returning home, Cuban refugees in the 1960s and 1970s more often than not remained engaged with their island nation, intent eventually on reclaiming losses and redressing grievances. Since loss of culture also meant disintegration of traditional identity and claim on the homeland, exiles did what they could to retain and cultivate their way of life. This psychological orientation informed almost everything in their daily activities, giving their preoccupation with return at least equal if not more importance than strategies of integration. At the same time Cubans evolved an ethnic identity through which they engaged North American society. Though Cubans rejected the idea of assimilation, reflecting the conviction that their situation was temporary and that they would eventually return home, they had to contend with the reality of integrating into new societies. For Cubans, assimilation meant turning their back on their heritage while integration sought ways of adjusting without losing their Cubanness. Exile and integration remained distinct ideas for Cubans, but they inevitably influenced each other. Cuban...