Iglesia Metodista en Cuba

Let me ask you something.

What would it take to stop your congregation from meeting?

A fuel shortage? A power grid collapse? A government that has spent decades teaching children that God does not exist?

For the Iglesia Metodista en Cuba none of that has been enough.

Right now, Cuba is in the middle of a serious humanitarian crisis. Fuel blockades and an ageing electrical grid have left millions of people without reliable power. Food and medicine are scarce.

And the Methodist Church is still growing.

The story of the Methodist Church in Cuba is one of resilience, faith, and evangelistic passion. It begins in 1883, when Cuban Methodist pastors living in Florida were sent back to the island to begin sharing the gospel. The Spanish-American War interrupted that work. In 1898, American missionaries arrived to take up the mission again, and a new phase of Cuban Methodism began.

Following the 1959 Cuban Revolution, the Iglesia Metodista en Cuba was hit by a devastating wave of suppression. American missionaries were expelled, and an astonishing 95% of the island’s ordained Methodist clergy fled to safety. The few believers left behind were restricted to existing buildings, and any young person openly identifying as a Christian faced immediate discrimination, including bans from universities.

By all human standards, the church should have died right there. But it didn’t.

The church became autonomous in 1968 and has remained self-supporting for decades. It is now present in all the provinces of the country. According to the World Council of Churches, the denomination currently has approximately 10,000 registered members across 320 congregations — with an additional 30,000 people reportedly attending worship services who are not yet on membership rolls. That last number tells you everything: people are walking through the doors faster than the paperwork can catch up.

One of the most remarkable aspects of the Cuban Methodist movement is its emphasis on multiplying disciples through local congregations and house churches. The church trains lay leaders to evangelize and establish cell groups. When a cell group grows to more than 20 people, it is converted into a mission and the lay leader becomes a missionary. Once a mission reaches the required number of baptized members, a house is converted into a church. That is how a new church is born.

World Methodist Evangelism has a long history of collaboration with the Methodist Church in Cuba, beginning with the WME Summit of the Americas held in Havana in 2004 and continuing to our current partnership. WME has provided training for the Church on many occasions, and we are blessed to annually take our FLAME Fellows cohorts there to experience the dynamic power of the Holy Spirit that is evident in the Methodist Church in Cuba.

As I think about our Cuban brothers and sisters, I’m reminded of something easy to forget: the church doesn’t thrive because circumstances are ideal. The church thrives when God’s people remain faithful.

A Prayer for the Methodist Church in Cuba

Gracious God, we come before you on behalf of our brothers and sisters in the Iglesia Metodista en Cuba. You know every darkened home. You know every empty shelf and every family that goes to bed hungry. You know the weight these faithful people carry and you have not left them alone.

We thank you that your church in Cuba refuses to be silent. That cell groups become missions, and missions become churches, and churches become beacons of hope in communities that have been told you do not exist. Prove yourself real to the people of Cuba. Let them encounter you through the love of your people.

Strengthen every pastor, missionary, and lay leader serving in this moment. Give them courage that does not depend on circumstances. Give them provision they cannot explain. Give them joy that the world cannot take away. And remind us, the worldwide Wesleyan Methodist family, that when one part of the body suffers, we all suffer with it.

May our prayers this week be more than words. In the name of Jesus, Amen.