CUBA. - I. GEOGRAPHY
The “pearl” and the largest of the Antilles (115,000 sq km with the neighboring islands). Oblong and narrow in shape, it lies entirely south of the tropic; its coasts are partly encircled by coral reefs. Barely 1/5 of its surface is mountainous (the Sierra Maestra, in the southern part, reaches 2,600 m.); the rest consists of flat or hilly land. The climate is tropical-oceanic, with abundant rainfall. The forests (now reduced to 1/6 of the island) have given way to cultivation: plantations of sugar cane (of which C. is the world’s largest producer), tobacco, coffee, and fruit (especially pineapples, bananas, and grapefruits). Livestock raising (pigs, horses, sheep) is by no means negligible. Among its many mineral resources, chromite and manganese are important, and copper to a lesser extent. Industry is little developed, apart from industries connected with agricultural production; commerce is almost entirely in the hands of the United States.
Of the population (5.1 million inhabitants in 1948; 45 per sq km), approximately two thirds are white, one seventh mixed-race, and one eighth Black; of the 1,500 Italians, half are concentrated in the capital, La Habana (833,000 inhabitants including the suburbs in 1943), the largest of the Central American cities (another 5 cities had more than 100,000 inhabitants and 7 more than 50,000 in 1943).
C. has been a unitary representative republic since 1898.
| Provinces | Area in sq km | Population (1943 census) in thousands | Provincial capitals (population in thousands) (1943 census) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Camagüey | 26346 | 488 | Camagüey (156) |
| La Habana | 8221 | 1236 | La Habana (673) |
| Matanzas | 8444 | 361 | Matanzas (74) |
| Oriente | 36602 | 1356 | Santiago (121) |
| Pinar del Rio | 13500 | 399 | Pinar del Rio (77) |
| S. Clara | 21411 | 939 | S. Clara (122) |
| TOTAL | 114524 | 4779 |
II. EVANGELIZATION
The island of C., discovered in 1492 by Columbus, who named it Juana, was subjected and colonized by the Spaniards from 1512 onward. The first Spanish colony, Baracca, was made a diocese in 1518; however, as early as 1522 the see was transferred to Santiago de C.
Among the peaceful Indians, enslaved by the Spaniards and soon wiped out, Bartholomew de Las Casas carried out his first missionary activity. From 1524 onward the importation of Black slaves began, continuing until the beginning of the 19th century, and thus one fourth of the population came to consist of people of color. In 1787 the second diocese, that of S. Christopher of Havana, was erected. Following the Treaty of Basel of 1795, S. Domingo was ceded to France, and, to prevent C. from continuing to depend on a metropolitan see located in non-Spanish territory, Charles IV obtained in 1803 that Santiago de C. be elevated to an archdiocese, with the suffragan sees of S. Christopher of Havana and Puerto Rico. During the emancipation from the Spanish American Empire, C. remained, on the whole, peaceful, and the island constituted the military base for the various expeditions organized by the Madrid government in an attempt to recover the rebel territories. Nevertheless, the Cubans’ state of mind was not favorable to Spain.
In 1868 there was the first attempt to withdraw from the sovereignty of Madrid. A civil war in fact broke out that year, lasting for a decade; it was brought to an end in 1878 by the Treaty of Zanjon, which guaranteed the Cubans an amnesty and the beginning of political reforms. Spiritually, however, C. by then regarded itself as independent of Spanish sovereignty: when a new revolt broke out in 1895, it was this revolt, following the intervention of the United States against Spain, that marked the end of Spanish rule. The island became an independent republic, but had to grant guarantees that subjected it to United States influence.
The Constitution of 1901 established the separation of Church and State. In 1903 the dioceses of Cienfuegos and Pinar del Rio were erected; in 1912 those of Matanzas and Camagüey; and in 1925 S. Christopher of Havana was elevated to an archdiocese, with the suffragan sees of Matanzas and Pinar del Rio, while the sees of Camagüey and Cienfuegos remained under the metropolitan see of Santiago de C. Since 1935 the Holy See has been represented in Havana by an apostolic nuncio. At the Consistory of 18 February 1946, Emanuele Arteaga y Betancourt, archbishop of S. Christopher of Havana, was awarded the cardinal’s purple, a dignity conferred then for the first time on a native of the island. Recently the representation accredited to the Holy See was raised to the rank of an embassy. The ecclesiastical jurisdiction comprises two metropolises, each with two suffragan dioceses; for the map: V. ANTILLE.
III. SCHOOL SYSTEM OF C
The Cuban Constitution provides freedom of teaching, the parents’ right to control their children’s education, and freedom of conscience, whereby attendance at religion courses is optional; it also guarantees private individuals the right to establish schools, and therefore the same right to the Catholic Church. Attendance at primary school is compulsory and free and lasts 8 years. The state school system is informed by the pedagogical doctrines of the Cubans José de la Luz Caballero and Wilson L. Gill, continuers of the patriotic association «Sociedad Económica de Habana» (1790), according to whose spirit, integrated with the conceptions of the English associationist school, the «Ciudad Escolar» was founded.The private schools include those of the Catholic Church, which are linked to the old traditions of Cuban culture and to the first Cuban school founded in the year 1522 under the name of Scholabria. There are 180 of them, including the colleges of S. Augustin and S. Antonio, as well as those of the Jesuits, the Brothers of the Christian Schools, the Marists, the Ursulines, and others.
Higher education is provided at the Universidad de Habana, founded in 1728 by the Dominicans Los padres de S. Juan de Létan, who were authorized to do so by Innocent XIII on 12 Sept. 1721; it was secularized in 1842. There is also a Catholic University of S. Tomaso at Villanova, with a well-organized Centro universitario cattolico.
The education of the Catholic clergy takes place at the Seminario de los Santos Carlos y Ambrosio in Habana, where studies in philosophy and theology are pursued after the preparatory studies, which may also be completed at the minor seminaries in Santiago de C. (Seminario Conciliar) and in Camagüey (Seminario di S. Maria).