Los franciscanos en Cuba: de la restauración a la revolución (1887-1961)

Abstract

The disentailment and secularization finished with the presence of the majority of the religious orders in Cuba in the middle of the XIXth century, and initiated an increasing process of secularization the Cuban society, whose upper and middle classes it happens and high already visible age a clear religious «indiferentismo”. Though after the signature of the concordat between Spain and the Holy See in 1851, the religious orders were authorized to return to the island, the Franciscans did not do it until 1887, experiencing since then a constant growth of his presence and pastoral activity from the independence of the island up to the victory of the revolution castrista in 1959. Adapting perfectly to the  needs of the Cuban society of the epoch, the labor of the Franciscans emphasized in the fields of the elementary education, the social assistance and the spiritual direction of the lay catholic asociations, especially the «Acción católica”.