On April 17, the Castro regime celebrated the 65th anniversary of an event that would change the history of the Americas: the proclamation of the socialist character of the Cuban Revolution — an act through which Havana would become a spearhead of Soviet influence in the heart of the hemisphere, and just 90 miles from the United States.

The symbolic significance of this date is immense for the State. In 2011, while in my second year of Journalism Studies at the University of Havana, I was brought before two investigative committees for having written a piece in which I argued that Cubans did not support socialism at the time — indeed, that they did not even fully understand what it was.

In his commemorative speech this year — 2026 — dictator Miguel Díaz-Canel once again reaffirmed the symbolism of the Old Order in Cuba: the Third World David against the imperial Goliath; revolutionary purity against perfidious counter-revolution.

He complained of alleged “laws to codify the bloqueo [embargo], terrorist attacks, smear campaigns, and constant sabotage of all projects involving integration, solidarity, and cooperation.” There was no mention of the more than 1,200 political prisoners, and certainly none regarding the harassment of dissident and Christian voices such as those of Anna Benssi, Jonhatan Muir, or Alfredo Fominaya.

Facing a gathering in Havana composed mostly of elderly citizens, placards stood out bearing vulgar and voluntaristic slogans — such as Raúl Castro’s “Yes we can, d*****!” and “Nobody surrenders here, go******!” Meanwhile, in his speech, Díaz-Canel referred to the migration of young people “educated for free in our schools and universities — institutions from which capitalism steals the capacity and talent in which it never invested.”

He conveniently overlooked the fact that, for decades, the State has robbed its citizens of the opportunity to engage in private enterprise — and that today, it uses entrepreneurs merely as cosmetic window dressing to project an image of openness to the international community. Nor did he explain that the very market he demonizes is what allows millions of Cubans to place their talents at the service of their families and communities — something that socialism restricts to the service of the Castro family and the State.

That Old Order is currently in a state of outright crisis: millions of exiles, a population living in nearly 90% poverty, and the constant ordeal of rolling blackouts. While Díaz-Canel concluded his speech by declaring that the socialist character of the Revolution was “the guarantee of the future,” the truth is that socialism has done nothing but drag the island back to pre-Columbian-era indicators.

While the cry of “Homeland or Death!” continues to ring out in Havana, just a 50-minute flight north — in Miami — the exile community promises something different: a New Order for the Cuba of the future.

For this reason, the Assembly of the Cuban Resistance (ARC) has called for a gathering on the evening of April 26 at the Bayfront Park Amphitheater, where representatives from various Christian denominations will offer prayers for the island’s freedom.

Operating under the banner “Unity for a Free Cuba,” this initiative will not be limited to Miami alone; as ARC Secretary General Orlando Gutiérrez-Boronat announced during a press conference, similar simultaneous events will also take place on the island itself and in other Latin American nations.

Gutiérrez-Boronat described the gathering as an act of “spiritual unity,” open to everyone, intended to offer prayers “for the liberation of Cuba.”

The ARC leader emphasized that this call to action is not intended to be a minor symbolic gesture or a mere community get-together. “We are asking people to come and pray for Cuba — to come and stand present for Cuba — and to come and demonstrate that we possess the numbers and the votes necessary to exert pressure and lend our support to the President [Donald Trump] and the Secretary of State [Marco Rubio],” he stated.

The objective of the event is to demand “real change,” specifically the removal from power of the Communist Party of Cuba (PCC) and the Castro family. Gutiérrez-Boronat characterized the Havana regime as a “diabolical” force and described prayer as a tool to confront “the destruction of the Cuban nation.”

Both Winston Churchill and Franklin D. Roosevelt appealed to prayer and to God in the context of World War II.

The British leader supported and promoted national days of prayer in the United Kingdom — such as in 1940, during the crisis following Dunkirk.

On June 6, 1944, during the Normandy landings (D-Day), the American leader broadcast a public prayer to the entire nation, inviting listeners to join in from their homes. He asked for divine protection for Allied soldiers and spoke of the struggle against National Socialist tyranny in moral and spiritual terms.

Just as decades ago — and now, facing the Castro regime’s own “Berlin Wall” — millions of Cubans, both on the island and in the diaspora, view faith and prayer as a vehicle through which freedom from on high may breathe life into the “valley of dry bones” into which socialism has transformed Cuba. These will be the new symbols for the island’s New Order, once it is restored to the orbit of the West.