By JUAN O. TAMAYO
             Herald Staff Writer

             Saying that the Cuban Revolution never had ``an anti-religious spirit, the island's
             Communist Party recommended Tuesday that the government give Cubans an
             annual day off for Christmas for the first time since 1969. Adoption by the
             government appeared certain.

             Cubans had started to prepare for the holiday even before the announcement,
             buying trees and decorations, and jamming state shops that had cut prices 30
             percent last week in anticipation of the festivities.

             Roman Catholic Church officials in Havana and the Vatican hailed the decision by
             the Communists' top body, the Political Bureau, explained in a communique that
             took up the entire front page of the party newspaper Granma.

             ``Although Christians in Cuba never stopped celebrating this event, reestablishing
             the . . . holiday is an act that does justice to our basic Christian culture, recognizes
             the purest religious sentiments of Cubans and reaffirms our traditions, a church
             statement said in Havana.

             ``The church appreciates . . . this gesture and expresses its full confidence that the
             road for Cuba's opening to the world [will result in] happiness, unity and hope for
             the Cuban people, the statement said.

             The Vatican's secretary of state, Cardinal Angelo Sodano, expressed ``satisfaction
             with the decision but pointedly noted that Cuban Catholics ``have been waiting
             years for this gesture.

             President Fidel Castro abolished the paid Christmas holiday in 1969, in the middle
             of a sugar harvest he said required all hands at work. He had declared his
             government officially communist and atheist seven years earlier.

             Castro decreed Christmas Day a national holiday last year, with most Cubans
             allowed to miss work, responding to a Vatican request as Pope John Paul II
             prepared for his historical visit in January.

             Many Cubans had expected the government to make the holiday permanent this
             year, especially after the Communist Party's top official on religious issues, Caridad
             Diego, said last month that she favored such a move.

             State stores that sell goods in Cuban pesos, more accessible to average Cubans
             than those that sell in U.S. dollars, last week announced a sale with 30 percent off
             all goods ``to mark the season.

             But many Cubans were surprised by the Communist Party's statement in Granma
             on Tuesday arguing that Cuban communism was never really anti-church or
             anti-religion.

             ``The Politburo analyzed the issue deeply and carefully, from the point of view of
             the political and revolutionary principles that have always guided our fight for
             national liberation, the construction of socialism in our homeland and its
             contribution to the effort that humanity has no choice but to make, to establish a
             just and beneficial socioeconomic system in our planet.

             Without providing details, the statement said the Cuban Revolution always
             ``defended itself from those ``who tried to use religious sentiments for
             counterrevolutionary purposes.

             ``But the Cuban Revolution was never characterized by an anti-religious sentiment,
             it added. ``With admirable serenity, it knew how to remain firm, reject and emerge
             victorious from those provocations.

             ``No other revolution in the history of humanity has a page so clean of violence or
             repression for religious motives, it said.

             Castro has lately reopened the doors to religious practice in Cuba, abandoning the
             Communist Party's official atheism, allowing more public Masses and giving Cuban
             church leaders occasional access to the state media.

             But hundreds of priests were expelled or jailed in the 1960s and 70s -- Cardinal
             Jaime Ortega served a term in a forced-labor camp -- and Cuba today remains the
             only Latin American nation that bans parochial schools.

             Authorities keep a tight rein on visas for foreign missionaries and have forced
             several to leave in the past two years.
 

                               Copyright © 1998 The Miami Herald