Pope Francis received President Raúl Castro of Cuba in audience on May 10, four months before the Pontiff’s apostolic journey to the Caribbean nation and the United States.

Castro, 83, met with the 78-year-old Pontiff for 50 minutes inside the Paul VI Audience Hall in what the Holy See Press Office described as a “very cordial” meeting. Afterwards, the Pope spoke with a dozen other Cuban officials, including the nation’s deputy prime minister and foreign minister.

The Cuban leader, who thanked the Pope for his role in improving Cuban-US relations, gave Pope Francis a medal portraying Havana’s cathedral and artwork portraying the cross as made out of barges. The Pope, in turn, gave Castro a copy of his apostolic exhortation on the proclamation of the Gospel and a medallion of St. Martin aiding the poor.

After the meeting, Castro praised the Pope for his “wisdom, modesty, and all his other qualities,” and said, “I read all the speeches of the Pope.” He went on: "If the Pope continues to speak like this, sooner or later I will start praying again and I will return to the Catholic Church—and I'm not saying this jokingly."

Cuba, a Communist-ruled nation of 11.3 million, is 60% Catholic. St. John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI also made apostolic journeys to the island.


http://www.catholicculture.org/news/headlines/index.cfm?storyid=24873

And just think...He could convert, be in full communion with Bergoglio...and still be a communist.

This would be good news if it's a sincere conversion, with Castro actually seeing the errors of his ways and returning to God and His Church. It's too early to tell whether it's anything more than a passing fondness for some of Pope Francis' diplomatic or political stances which have nothing really to do with the Faith. A real conversion would be something like the atheist journalist Peter Seewald becoming a Catholic after a conversation with Pope Benedict XVI.

Al Gore, who served as vice president of the United States from 1993 to 2001, said in a recent talk that he is inspired by Pope Francis’s leadership on environmental issues, according to a Daily Caller report.

“I think Pope Francis is quite an inspiring figure really,” he said at the University of California at Berkeley. “I’ve been startled with the clarity of the moral force that he embodies.”

“I was raised in the Southern Baptist tradition, I could become a Catholic because of this Pope,” he added. “He is that inspiring to me. And I know the vast majority of my Catholic friends are just thrilled to the marrow of their bones that he is providing this kind of spiritual leadership

http://www.catholicculture.org/news/headlines/index.cfm?storyid=24895

Quote from: Ladislaus

Raul has simply sensed a kindred spirit in Francis, a fellow Marxist.  So it's Francis giving the impression that the Church has gone Communist rather than Raul intending to abandon Communism to become Catholic.

It's not unlike when all the Masonic publications hailed the election of Roncalli in 1958.

That is accurate. But if he returns into the conciliar church, he would still need to convert to Catholicism and the Catholic Church.

Yeah right, all these people hailed teh new popes until Pope Paul VI issued Humanae Vitae in which he stated that artificial contraception is still a sin. Then they all turned on him.
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