Pope's trip to Cuba will focus on families

HAVANA - In the shadow of a giant image of Argentine Che Guevara, workmen are in the final stages of building the altar where Argentina-born Pope Francis will celebrate Mass in the Plaza de la Revolucion during his four-day visit to Cuba next month.

Tens of thousands of Cubans are expected to attend three masses - in Havana, Holguin and El Cobre, which is outside Santiago - during the pope's visit. About 1,000 pilgrims from abroad also are expected in Cuba.

It falls to Rolando Suarez, lawyer for the Cuban Conference of Catholic Bishops, to coordinate the logistics for international pilgrims and to organize buses and other transportataion for Cubans from around the country who want to attend the masses and take part in other activities during the pope's visit.

The church estimates 32,000 Cubans from Sancti Spiritus to Pinar del Rio will attend the Mass in Havana with 16,000 nuns, priests and seminarians and tens of thousands from Havana, Suarez said. The Mass in Holguin is expected to attract 34,000 from Ciego de Avila to Guantanamo, not counting residents of the provincial capital.

In El Cobre, an old copper mining town, Mass will be celebrated in the minor basilica of the National Sanctuary of Our Lady of Charity del Cobre, Cuba's patron saint. About 1,000 people - representing each Cuban province - are expected to be seated inside the basilica, with 2,000 more outside.

Afterward, Francis plans a "family encounter" with 30 people from each of Cuba's provinces at Santiago's Cathedral of Our Lady of Assumption before leaving Cuba to continue his trip to Washington, D.C., New York and Philadelphia.

Francis had a role in encouraging a rapprochement between the two formerly hostile neighbors. The two countries re-established diplomatic relations and opened respective embassies on July 20 for the first time in more than 50 years.

Last September, Cardinal Jaime Ortega, the archbishop of Havana, hand-delivered a letter from Francis to the White House offering to help however he could in the secret negotiations between the two countries. Francis, who sent a personal letter to Cuban President Raul Castro, offered the Vatican as one of the meeting places for the talks.

The pope impressed the leaders. Obama has called him "the real deal," and Castro has said he will be at all three Masses in Cuba and might even consider a return to the Catholic Church.

With less than a month to go, evidence of the pope's impending arrival can be seen in the work at the plaza and the posters reading "Bienvenido (welcome) Francisco" that have begun to pop up around Cuba.

Getting ready is a challenge because the Vatican announced only in late April that Francis would be visiting Cuba. When Pope Benedict XVI visited, there was a year to get ready.

If the number of international pilgrims coming to Cuba seems low, it's probably because Latin Americans have already had a chance to see Francis this year during his eight-day trip to Bolivia, Ecuador and Paraguay in June, and because of his upcoming U.S. trip.

The pope is expected to arrive at Havana's airport at 4:05 p.m. Sept. 19 and give a speech before leaving in an open car that will take him through some heavily populated areas of the city. A children's choir will greet him at the Nunciatura Apostolic, where he'll spend the night.