My second child is about to be born. It could be any day. My wife and I await him with the love and trembling that only parents know. He will be born fragile and tearful, but with the potential to reach for the stars.

This year, another birth may be about to take place in that elongated wound in the Caribbean called Cuba, the last Berlin Wall of the West. The violence and the hope of giving birth to political change connect the tense hours of waiting and pain with the anticipation of what is to come.

The millions of Cubans on the island who have not wanted or been able to flee, along with the millions who have wanted or had to, remain attentive to the voracious news cycle. They follow the dashed lines on mobile apps that mark the passage of spy planes over the island; they follow influencers commenting on news agency reports. They follow the tweets of Cuban-American congressmen more than the speeches of dictator Miguel Díaz-Canel.

Many viewed Nicolás Maduro’s removal as a scene from a movie, a prelude to a sequel that could signify the beginning of the end for Cuban socialist tyranny. The longed-for transition? We know that a transition away from the Castros is desired, but after that, where to?

Cubans today fantasize with artificial intelligence tools, about a bridge between the Florida Keys and Cuba, or the reconstruction of Havana. But, as I discussed with the host of a Miami television show a few days ago, the most difficult reconstruction will not be that of buildings (despite the irretrievable loss of entire blocks of eclectic architecture), but rather the reconstruction of the spirit and culture of the people.

Contrary to the call from major U.S. oil companies to contribute to the reconstruction of Venezuela’s oil infrastructure and the country in general, President Donald Trump has consistently referred to the successful and extensive exile community in the United States when it comes to Cuba. In other words, Cubans would be at the forefront of rebuilding the country — yes, those spat upon and rejected in “marches of the fighting people” and called “the Miami mafia” — they are the hope for the island’s future.

But spiritual and cultural reconstruction is another matter entirely. It’s decades of socialist propaganda, of a culture of death promoted by the State (Cuba floats in the blood of millions of aborted babies and those who have been shot and tortured), of ideologies that exalt man and reject our tradition as a territory connected to the Christian West.

On December 1, 1492, Admiral Christopher Columbus landed in what is now Baracoa, upon discovering Cuba on his first voyage. There he planted a wooden cross, the Cross of the Vine, one of the 20-odd planted in America, the oldest Christian relic on the continent. It is still preserved today in the parish church of Baracoa.

Christianity, the majority religion on the island and within which the freedoms of expression, religion, and association were instituted as we know them today, shaped Cuban culture for more than five centuries.

Criminalizing those who lived according to that faith was essential for Castroism to generate isolated individuals, without a past or sense of the present and future, easily manipulated by foreign ideologies such as socialism in the 20th century, or gender ideology in the 21st. It is no coincidence that in February 1959, weeks after Castro’s rise to power, Executive Law No. 74 eliminated the phrase “So help me God” from the oaths of office for public officials.

The thinker Dagoberto Valdés has spoken of the “anthropological damage” inflicted on the Cuban population by generations of subsistence under Castro’s propaganda and oppression. But the concept is further complemented by an addition from the Cuban poet and Christian Claudette Betancourt: it is a “spiritual and anthropological damage.”

It is not only important in a democratic Cuba to get rid of centralism in favor of the free market; To stop envying those who undertake projects with honesty and success, and instead cultivate a culture of productivity and personal agency; to stop looking with the short-sightedness of atheism and start raising our eyes to the heavens. That is the true challenge, to retrace our steps, erased by the leftists in power.

In this sense, there is hope: young evangelicals are leading independent political communication on social media, and “Make Cuba Great Again” has become fashionable  — with all its immanence. The oft-repeated phrase that freedom begins within can be interpreted as the recognition of a spiritual and cultural condition.

Like Betancourt, I believe that in the midst of chaos, Cubans must understand the seemingly laughable premise that they are human beings. For so many years, we have repeated speeches and have been indoctrinated and infantilized, that this seems to be forgotten! The poet emphasizes that when the adults of an entire society are subjected to annulment and infantilization — perhaps referring to totalitarian statist “paternalism” — the result is aberrant.

“Children are guided because they don’t yet have the capacity or maturity to make many decisions for themselves, but when an adult is treated like a child, suppressing their critical thinking skills (which they usually already possess, however minimal), a monster emerges, a degrading experiment,” the young woman reflected. “That’s why the message right now is to remember who we are, that which we have forgotten under the weight of abuse and the struggle for survival. To raise awareness that yes, we are thinking beings, we have rights, and the capacity to make decisions.” This is something, he says, that is essential to rebuild the country, when all this is over.

His words don’t point to the unbridled experimentation from ivory towers, but rather the patient serenity of looking at our shared heritage and tradition, understanding that we were capable of founding a prosperous Republic with civil liberties. And yes, also one that can be improved.

A new Cuba must return to the orbit of the West, to which it historically, culturally, and spiritually belongs, and from which it was torn by the putrid hand of socialism. The violent birth we expect soon will be only the beginning.