Cuba hopes for another native Saint

CAMAGUEY, Cuba (Zenit) - Cubans may soon have another native son proclaimed blessed by the Church, just over a year after the first Cuban blessed was beatified.

Archbishop Juan García Rodríguez of Camaguey announced this month that the beatification of José Olallo Valdés is expected for November 2008. The cause for his beatification has been under way for about two decades.

Father Olallo Valdés was a religious nurse of the Order of Hospitallers who lived in the 19th century in a convent-hospital.

During a Dec. 7 pilgrimage to the church where his remains rest, representatives of the diocese met to recall Father Olallo, "a notable representative of the Camagueyan identity and tradition," according to the news service of Archbishop García Rodríguez.

The probable date of November 2008 was also announced by the archbishop of Camaguey to a group of Cubans residing in Madrid, Spain, according to the Diario Exterior newspaper.

The first Cuban to be raised to the altar was Augustinian Brother José López Piteira, a native of San Jose de Jatibonico, who was beatified in Rome on October 28, together with 497 other martyrs, the majority of whom were Spanish.