Pope Francis visits with Fidel Castro

HAVANA – Pope Francis met with Fidel Castro on Sunday after urging tens of thousands of Cubans to serve one another and not an ideology, delivering a subtle jab at the communist system during a Mass celebrated under the gaze of an image of Che Guevara in Havana’s iconic Plaza of the Revolution.

The Vatican described the 40-minute meeting at Castro’s residence as informal and familial, with an exchange of books and discussion about big issues facing humanity, including Francis’ recent encyclical on the environment and the global economic system.

Video of the encounter broadcast on Cuban state media showed the 89-year-old former president chatting animatedly with Francis and shaking the pope’s hand, the pope standing in his white vestments and Castro sitting in a white button-down shirt and Adidas sweat top.

The meeting brought together the leader who shaped Cuba for the last half of the 20th century and Latin America’s first pope, who many Cubans credit with opening a path to the future by mediating the warming diplomatic relations between their country and the United States. After his Cuba visit, the pope flies to Washington for his first trip to the U.S.

Francis called on both Fidel and Raul Castro after celebrating Mass in Havana’s main plaza on his first full day in Cuba. Believers and nonbelievers alike streamed into the square before dawn, and they erupted in cheers when the pope spun through the crowd in his open-sided popemobile. Francis wound his way slowly through the masses, stopping to kiss children held up to him.

At one point, Francis was approached by a man who grabbed onto the popemobile and appeared to be speaking emotionally to the pontiff, who touched him on his hand and head before he was pulled away by security agents. Video showed what appeared to be the same man throwing leaflets in the air, and backers of a Cuban dissident group said on Twitter he was a member of the opposition.

The head of the opposition group Ladies in White said 22 of 24 members of her group who wanted to attend Mass were prevented from going by Cuban security agents. And two other well-known Cuban dissidents said agents detained them after the Vatican invited them to the pope’s vespers service at the Cathedral of Havana.

Marta Beatriz Roque and Miriam Leiva received invitations from the office of the papal ambassador in Havana but said they were arrested as they tried to travel to the cathedral.

“They told me that I didn’t have a credential and that I couldn’t go to the pope’s event that was taking place there in the Plaza of the Cathedral,” Roque said.

Vatican spokesman Federico Lombardi said some dissidents were invited to events to receive a greeting from the pope, although not in a formal meeting. He said the dissidents never showed up but he could not confirm that it was because they had been arrested.

While most Cubans are nominally Catholic, less than 10 percent practice their faith and Cuba is the least Catholic country in Latin America. The Vatican said 200,000 people attended Sunday’s Mass, more than at similar celebrations in the same plaza by Pope Benedict XVI in 2012 and St. John Paul II in 1998.

“This is very important for us,” said Mauren Gomez, who traveled some 155 miles from Villa Clara to Havana by bus, spending her time reciting the rosary.

In his homily, Francis urged Cubans to care for one another out of a sense of service, not ideology. He encouraged them to refrain from judging each other by “looking to one side or the other to see what our neighbor is doing or not doing.”

“Whoever wishes to be great must serve others, not be served by others,” he said. “Service is never ideological, for we do not serve ideas, we serve people.”

Maria Regla Gonzalez, a teacher, said she appreciated Francis’ message of reconciliation.

“This is a crucial moment, and the pope’s support for us is very important,” she said. “He made a call for unity, and that’s what we want.”

After his meeting with Fidel Castro, Francis met for an hour with Fidel’s brother Raul, a declared atheist who has, perhaps jokingly, said he likes the pope so much he is thinking of returning to his Catholic roots. Francis thanked the 84-year-old leader for his pardon of thousands of petty criminals before his arrival.