Skip to main content

Why Cuba’s Muslim population is growing




Juan Enriquez, 70, became known by his Muslim name, Yahya, after he converted to Islam in 2007. Here, he calls to Friday’s prayer in the mosque of Camagüey, which was built inside a private home to avoid problems with the Cuban authorities.

The first time a pope ever set foot in Cuba was in 1998, when John Paul II traveled to the Communist state. The visit was the result of a thaw between the Vatican and Cuba’s president, Fidel Castro, who banned religion in 1959 when he seized power. Cuba’s majority-Catholic population welcomed the pontiff with great excitement; several hundred thousand people, including Castro, attended the Mass led by the pope in Havana. Meanwhile, a small number of other Cubans drew their own conclusion from the regime’s growing tolerance of religion: Perhaps soon the state would increasingly accept Islam too.The religion is now quietly growing in Cuba, where there are as many as 9,000 Muslims. While they represent a tiny segment of Cuba’s 11.3 million population, it’s a significant increase from roughly a dozen in the early 1990s. “The Communist Party has been making decisions to open up religious plurality,” says Michael Leo Owens, associate professor of political science at Emory University in Atlanta. “Islam will naturally grow.”
Because there isn’t a long legacy of Islam in Cuba, many of the island’s Muslims are converts who found the faith after speaking with students and diplomats visiting from Muslim-majority countries, says Joan Alvado, a photojournalist based in Barcelona, Spain. Starting in 2014, Alvado has photographed the lives of Cuba’s Muslims, in the capital of Havana and around the country. Most recently, Alvado returned to Cuba, from early October to early November, to further explore this tiny culture, and his work is showcased here.
01_06_Cuba_SS_01


Yarima plays with Islamic prayer beads as her father, Ali, 33, holds her. Ali and his wife converted to Islam in 2014; Yarima is one of the first babies in Cuba born a Muslim.

Osman Reyes, one of Alvado’s subjects, converted to Islam in June 2015. He says the religion helped him to feel “more free,” according to Alvado. Reyes lives near the central Cuban city of Camaguey, where local Muslims established a humble mosque inside a private home in the early 2000s.

Despite being part of the fastest-growing religious group in the world—a Pew Research Center report estimates the world’s Muslim population will increase by 73 percent by 2050—Cuba’s Muslims can seem invisible, even to other Cubans. “No one in Havana, even my Cuban friends, knew that there were Muslims,” Alvado says.

In the early 1990s, the handful of Muslim citizens in Cuba faced possible persecution by the regime for practicing their religion, but most worshipped on their own; few could teach them about their newfound faith. Now they have leadership, teachers and a large house of worship that opened in Havana in June 2015. The mosque distributes traditional Muslim dress to men and women and donates lamb to congregants during Ramadan.
01_06_Cuba_SS_08
Muslims gather in a new mosque in La Habana. The mosque, which opened in June of 2015, was built by the Arabia Saudi authorities in the Habana Vieja quarter, with the approval of the Cuban government.

Adapting to Islam has been a significant departure for Cubans, many of whom grew up eating pork and drinking alcohol. Most Cuban Muslims have adapted gradually. A lack of experts or imams to guide their way has meant that old traditions survive even as the converts adopt new ways of living under Islam. In one of his photographs, Alvado features a small Christmas tree next to a green Saudi Arabian flag. The decorations belong to a Catholic-born Cuban woman who has been a Muslim for five years.


“She still puts the Christmas tree up every year,” says Alvado. “The Muslim community in Cuba is really young.”It’s unclear whether Castro’s death in November will affect Cuba’s religious revival. Castro had already passed the presidency on to his younger brother Raúl in 2008, though he continued to represent a powerful and uncompromising faction in Cuban politics. “The hard-liner elements of the Cuban government lost their greatest mouthpiece,” says Andrew Otazo, executive director of Washington-based think tank the Cuba Study Group. Cubans will be watching anxiously to see whether Castro’s death will lead to reform or whether hard-liners—insecure about where they stand now—will crack down on religion. “Will there be more religious freedom or ability to practice your religion if you see fit? That’s the big question,” he says

Explore Alvado’s work inside the world of Cuba’s Muslims below.
01_06_Cuba_SS_14
Muhammad Ali walks home under the Capitolio building, in the Habana Vieja quarter of La Habana. Ali, born Manuel, became Muslim 20 years ago, at a time when very few Cubans had had any exposure to the religion.

01_06_Cuba_SS_13

A Muslim group prays in front of a home in a small, isolated village in the Baracoa province. After the family’s home was struck by Hurricane Matthew, other Muslims in the area began visiting to offer economic support.

Source : muslim-stories

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

10 Oldest Manuscripts of The Quran

Allah said in Surah al-Hijr, Ayah 09: Indeed, it is We who sent down the Quran and indeed, We will be its Guardian. And undoubtedly, the present-day Quran is same as the Quran which was revealed to Prophet Muhammad (PBUH). In this post, we take a look at some of the oldest manuscripts of the Quran, including ones that date back to the days of Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) and the Rightly-Guided Caliphs. 10 Oldest Manuscripts of The Quran 1. Birmingham Quran Manuscript In 2015, at the University of Birmingham, scientists found an old Quranic manuscript on parchment, using clearly legible Arabic Hijazi script. It is said to be one of the oldest manuscripts, and it dates back to sometime between 568 and 645 CE, that is, probably sometime during the life of Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) himself. 2. Sana’a Quran Manuscript The Sana’a Quran manuscript was found in Yemen in 1972 during the restoration of the Great Masjid of Sana’a. The manuscript is written on parchmen...

Why do Dogs start Barking (Howling) at the time of Azan ?

Q uestions: Why do dogs cry at the time of Fajr Azan? This is an incident that I’ve noticed very often. A nswer: Praise be to Allah, the Lord of the Worlds; and may His blessings and peace be upon our Prophet Muhammad and upon all his Family and Companions. There are many wonders of Allah in His Creation. Dogs are among His Creatures. It is confirmed in a Hadith that dogs see what human beings cannot see. Abu Dawud reported in his Sunan that Jabir Ibn Abdullah narrated that the Prophet (Sallallahu Alaihi wa Sallam) said:” If you hear the barking of dogs and the braying of donkeys by night, seek refuge in Allah, as they see what you cannot see”. Albani and others classified this Hadith as authentic. In Sahih Al Jamie’, following the above Hadith is stated: ..’And reduce going out when it is quiet( when everybody is indoors at night time) as Allah diffuses by night what He wishes among His Creation, and lock your doors and mention the Name of Allah on them as ...

Teen who was forced into marriage sentenced to death for killing husband as he raped her

A 19-year-old Sudanese woman who was forced to marry against her will has been sentenced to death for fatally stabbing her husband while he raped her. The case of Noura Hussein, who has said that she was held down by her husband’s relatives as he raped her, has sparked a nationwide discussion in a country where forced marriages are widespread — children can married off by their families at age 10 — and marital rape is legal. On Thursday, a judge in Omdurman sentenced Hussein to death after her husband’s family refused options to pardon her or accept financial compensation and demanded her execution instead. Hussein, who was forcibly married off by her father at the age of 15, had escaped her husband’s clutches for three years by running away from home and living with an aunt. But after she was deceived into returning home, her father turned her over to her husband’s family who then aided in her rape after she refused to consummate the marriage. HORRIFIC!!! “Forced to marr...