PHILADELPHIA — After back-to-back natural disasters in recent weeks, the Cuban people “are suffering immense hardships and … need our help,” said Archbishop Nelson J. Pérez of Philadelphia in a Nov. 18 statement. On Nov. 10, a 6.8-magnitude earthquake shook the eastern end of the island, four days after the Category 3 Hurricane Rafael made landfall. Both disasters followed on the heels of Hurricane Oscar, which struck Cuba Oct. 21, killing at least six, and the Oct. 18 collapse of a thermoelectric power plant in Matanzas, a further blow to Cuba’s failing power grid, which has seen regular 15- to 20-hour blackouts. Archbishop Pérez, the son of Cuban exiles who emigrated to the U.S., said he was “deeply saddened” by the rapid-fire sequence of the storms, the earthquake and the energy grid crisis. (OSV News)
