Neither politics nor religion
Unplash Photo
By Francisco Almagro Domínguez
Those were the days of the bloody civil war in Nicaragua in the eighties. We frequently visited the house of a Nicaraguan mother, a friend of the Medical Brigade. She had been to Cuba, and she had very fond memories of its people. There was always time to leave nostalgia there; and satiate physical and spiritual hunger.
One day I arrived unannounced. In the living room, I found three men of whom I could recognize two. The former was the brother of an important Sandinista commander – he was also a high-ranking officer. The other was the most notorious opponent of the people, to the point that Cuban State Security – there was always someone who "attended" to the aid workers – warned of his dangerous influence.
The three men seasoned the conversation with some very cold "chelas". For the young and insolent Cuban that I was, that was inconceivable: enemies do not share drinks in a bleeding country. I told the hostess. It seemed an offense to so much death and destruction everywhere. And she, with that patience that Mesoamerican survivors of so much anguish have said:
"They are childhood friends. When they meet, they never talk about politics."
The grandmother's phrase that to maintain friendships and a good family environment one should not talk about politics or religion has a proverbial wisdom—tension and seeing the other as the enemy has no geographical or cultural limits. But perhaps because we are Caribbean – the climatic influence – our disagreements have the additional anger and resentment. We are not given to apologize for wrongs; we feel any opinion against it as a personal offense, an attack on our morality and good deeds.
I imagine that Cuban great-grandmothers and grandmothers would say it from their own experience. They lived through the Machadato. Those who supported the Egregious conceded the modernity of the Republic. To those who hated him, he was "an ass with claws." Batista was the mulatto sergeant who had reached the presidency with the favor of the communists; then he "woke up early" to the inconsistent Prío with the support of the "living classes" without a single death. The corpses of the young people came later. The same people who placed him in the presidential chair conspired to remove him from power.
But there were always spaces and times to share with friends and family without wishing for the destruction of the other. Christmas, death, or birth were propitious for burying the axe. One of the fateful novelties of the Cuban Involution was the family disagreement and turning friends into enemies. If you didn't think like a "revolutionary"—which was nothing more or less than agreeing with the Late Leader—you were a "worm." The place of the "scum" was outside their country. Political apartheid has not changed its essence. Only that he has become more cynical and interested. Today worms are butterflies and filings are turned into gold by the work of communist alchemy.
In exile, beans are also cooked. Being in favor of the blockade embargo or against it is reason enough for a family gathering to end like the Guatao party – there are at least three versions of the facts, all tragic. Some say that the Embarblockade is the regime's justification for victimizing itself. Those in favor, that the Bloquembargo is the only way to suffocate the dictatorship.
Whether or not to send remittances to relatives on the island is another issue for outbursts and not a few enmities. In favor of those who argue that without the enemy's currency in Cuba life is almost impossible. Those who are about not to send a single dollar argue that the regime is the one who takes over the work of those who one day expelled from their land with eggs – today two dozen is a month of work – and frantic cries "Let them go".
Religious themes also carry the ink. Practicing a religion is something very personal, one would say an experience rather than an idea. People who have not had this "encounter with the Faith" are not unfortunate – that is, they do not possess the Grace of God. Atheists and agnostics ask as evidence is asked in a court of law – and the conversation ends up being just that, a trial – for "concrete facts" to believe. Intolerant, fanatical religious practitioners ask how one can live without Faith; in fact, they end up judging those who judge them in the same way. And such a chain of impostures ends in accusations and insurmountable ruptures.
We have lived for several years in battles of opinions – they are always opinions – that are not worth the love and affection of a brother, a son, or an old friend. The intolerance of the warring sides confronts people who perhaps seek the same thing by different routes. Finding a point of convergence, of win-win, could be the antidote to disagreement. No politician or religious person "pays my rent," says a good neighbor.
In the same way, it is sometimes difficult to avoid a current issue where political or religious-philosophical elements are involved (abortion, euthanasia, homosexuality). Faced with such a trap that slides towards the inevitable confrontation, it is advisable to go to another level of dialogue where humor and absurdity work the miracle of stopping the also absurd enmity over controversial issues. A close friend had an infallible phrase for that moment. Amid the increase in conversational temperature, he asked:
"Finally… how much is Esther Borja hitting?"
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