HAVING shed his celebrated army fatigues for a dark-blue double-breasted suit, President Fidel Castro of Cuba paused on the threshold of the Pontifical Library and bowed slightly to the Pope. "Your Holiness, it is a great, honour for me to be here today, he said.
The Pope smiled and replied:
"Thank you for your visit. You are most welcome.
Thus began yesterday's historic private audience in the Vatican between Pope John Paul II (76), and the Cuban President (70), two of the most charismatic figures on the world stage and two leaders who apparently had little difficulty in overcoming dramatic ideological differences to engage in a 35-minute dialogue.
In theory, these two great figures have made diametrically opposed contributions to modern history. The Polish Pope will bed forever recalled as one of the major contributors to the downfall of Eastern Bloc communism, while Dr Castro is not only one of the world's few remaining communist leaders but also someone who, as he said at last week's UN world food summit in Rome, is a proud defender of his brand of Marxist-Leninist "revolucion".
Those differences, however, did not stop the two ageing leaders from engaging in a frank exchange, held in an atmosphere described by the senior Vatican spokesman, Dr Joaquin Navarro-Valls, as "open and clear".
We may, of course, never know exactly what the two had to say to one another since they were alone in the Pontifical Library, thanks to the fact that the Pope has good Spanish. What we do know, however, is that the Pope accepted Dr Castro's invitation to visit Cuba - the only Latin American country not yet visited by the Pope - some time next year.
Dr Navarro-Vals said the two leaders had discussed the "normalisation" of the position of the Catholic Church in Cuba and the role of Catholic believers in Cuban society. Currently, freedom of worship and religious instruction in Cuba are limited to church premises.
Although Dr Navarro-Vals declined to be specific, it is likely that the Pope pushed Dr Castro on the need for greater democracy in Cuba and, in particular, for church access to the media, as well as for priests, nuns and the church charity, Caritas, to be allowed work unhindered.
Dr Castro is likely to have repeated remarks made on Sunday when he praised Cuba's social achievements in education and healthcare, calling them "miracles" achieved "thanks to the revolution". Dr Castro did, however, formally thank the Pope for the great contribution made to Cuba by the church in the fields of education and healthcare.
It is unlikely the question of the controversial US embargo on Cuba was discussed - there is already Vatican-Cuban agreement on the issue. During a visit to Cuba last month to prepare the ground for yesterday's Vatican audience, the Vatican's foreign minister, the French Archbishop Jean-Louis Tauran, had condemned the US embargo on Cuba while, as recently as last week in his address to the UN food summit, the Pope condemned all embargos which sought to use food or medicines as weapons.
As President Castro left the Pope at the end of their audience, he turned and said: "Goodbye, Your Holiness. I hope to see you in Cuba next year." To which the Pope replied: "Thank you and thanks for your visit. Take my blessing for the people of Cuba with you."
Yesterday's audience and next year's proposed papal visit to Cuba represent the culmination of patient diplomatic work which has seen the Vatican and Cuba maintain uninterrupted diplomatic relations since the 1959 revolution.
Yesterday's audience also ended a brilliantly successful four-day visit to Rome by Dr Castro, a visit marked by arguably the most effective speech at the UN food summit, where he called the UN's aim of reducing the world's 840 million chronically undernourished to half that number by the year 2015 a "shamefully modest" objective.