Cult of the Dead

In close relation the myth making and the formation of national identity is the cult of the dead. Holydays are established across the year to commemorate the dead. Starting with the celebration of the Triumph of the Revolution on January 1^st a sort of Revolutionary calendar is made of, Roman numbers included. Dates of cult of the dead are July 26^th, the day of the assault to Moncada barracks in 1953 and particularly the torture and death of Abel Santamaria. Death of Commander Camilo Cienfuegos, occurred on October 28 of 1959. Death Antonio Benitez and Manuel Ascunce Domenech, heroes of the Alphabetization National Campaign, cowardly assassinated on January 5^th and November 26^th  of 1961 respectively. And many other death “efemerides”. These deaths have been given mystical rendition in songs and hymns such as the Hymn of Alphabetization and the Song of the Chosen One, thus becoming powerful conveyors of propaganda messages.

The cult of the dead reached absurd highs and perverse connotations with the discovery and relocation of the bones of Che Guevara. Che’s remains were brought from Bolivia and exposed inside a wooden urn at Plaza de la Revolucion.  Much talk has been shed about the authenticity of the bones, but whether authentic or not, million of Cubans parade before them at Plaza de la Revolucion during several days of the year1997, brought in by trucks and buses from work and school places

Year after year on the anniversary of the disappearance of Camilo Cienfuegos, who died on October 28 of 1959 during a flight from Camaguey to Havana, Cuban children around the country march by the coastline to throw flowers in the waters of seas and rivers. Not only children, adults do so too. I remember going from the classroom, together with other hundreds of schoolmates and teachers to join the procession to the waterfront of Havana –malecon- to throw flowers in the sea. And as an adult going from my workplace, each of us a flower in hand, walking across the city on the way to the malecon.

The cult of the dead cut across time and space. Across time a connection is established between past, present and future. The dead of the past enforces the moral obligation to endure a present that would give way to an imagined future for which the dead gave their lives. Not to sacrifice everything for that future would be tantamount to betrayal of the dead. To abandon the promise of socialism and communism would be the recognition that the martyrs and heroes have died in vain. The program of the Revolution and Marxist materialism thus needs to be fulfilled. No matter how many proofs the present can provide about the failure of the principles of Marxist economic politics and socialist doctrine, the future acquires religious status and the dead are it saints.

The blood shed in combat nurtures the soil and becomes the semen of a forged identity. Thousands of Cubans have died in Angola, Nicaragua, Venezuela, Congo, Bolivia, Ethiopia, the blood spread in those countries permits a claim to possession. A spiritual connection is established between the buried corpse and the minerals that covers and surrounds it, the plants that feed upon its remains and the animals that roam and eat these plants. Home and country is where you are buried, therefore Hugo Chavez doesn’t have any problems when he publicly recognizes that as of April 16 of 2010, out of a total of 35,000 Cuban doctors, nurses and teachers, 69 doctors have died in Venezuela. These deaths are compensated by deliverance of 100,000 barrels of oil and derivatives daily to Cuba, thus confirming the connection between blood and soil and the forging of identity by their mix.