``We shouldn't have to sleep this holy night,'' Cardinal Jaime Ortega told those gathered inside the 18th-century church. ``We should celebrate.''
And celebrate they did -- eating traditional Noche Buena dinners of roast pork and black beans and rice, drinking rum and beer, dancing, sleeping late Thursday and reuniting with relatives.
For the first time since 1969, Cubans did not have to worry about work or school on Christmas morning, because President Fidel Castro declared Dec. 25 an official holiday in honor of next month's visit by Pope John Paul II.
``I was out 'til 2 in the morning,'' said Leonor, a dentist in the Santo Suarez area who was invited to her first Christmas Eve party in many years. ``Everyone has pork. Everyone has trees in their homes. Everyone has hope.''
Catholic churches across the island were packed for the services of song, incense, prayer and the placing of the Christ child in the empty manger.
Some attended out of pure curiosity.
``I just came to see,'' said Jesus, 37, watching from the thick wooden cathedral doors. ``I remember the Christmas trees at my grandparents' house, the Christmas dinners. And then they just disappeared.''
Jesus spoke quietly and refused to give his last name. He said he was not a member of any faith, but was delighted with the holiday.
``I am going to rest all day,'' he said with a smile.
Cuba officially became an atheist nation three years after the 1959 revolution that brought Castro to power. Christmas as a government-sanctioned holiday disappeared in 1969. Castro said it interfered with the sugar harvest.
But it never really vanished from many Cuban homes. Even during ``the special period'' -- the term for the fuel and food crisis Cuba faced after the fall of the Soviet Union -- people bought ham on the black market for Dec. 24 Noche Buena meals and loved ones exchanged greeting cards. But the traditions of Christmas were observed quietly and privately, even after the government began eliminating restrictions on religious worship in 1992.
Thursday, Cubans said they felt they could celebrate more publicly.
``It's more open,'' said Jose, a retired athletic coach who lives in Havana's Playa neighborhood. He remembers when people put fake Christmas trees up in the rear of their homes -- where nobody could see them from the street.
``Now they have it in the front with the door wide open,'' he said.
In 1995, the government limited the display of Christmas trees to tourist areas, hard-currency stores and private households. But this year, trees have popped up in some schools and even public places.
In fact, Christmas trees and other holiday items have sold out at stores.
Despite a severe economic crisis, families scraped together the money to buy pork roast, apple cider and other treats for a traditional holiday meal.
Cubans began lining up early Wednesday at one bustling market in the Vedado district to buy government pork.
``We have always done something special for Christmas Eve, even if it was just fried eggs,'' said Yaneysi Rodriguez, 28, who measured out mandarin oranges in a large rusty scale. ``But this year, we are going to have a big dinner with pork leg.''
But for most Cubans, food was the mainstay of their celebration.
``There were more gifts in the stores,'' said a man who only identified himself as Cao. ``A lot of little things. Many different dolls. Little Santa Claus figures, the size of a small child, that rock in a chair.
``The only problem is that they don't pay you in dollars here. But in the stores, they sell everything for dollars.''
He eyed the Santa for his wife. But although his son in Miami sends him money on a regular basis, he couldn't spare the $50.
``I didn't give her anything. Just my warmth and my love,'' he said.
``Everything here is more expensive than there,'' he said with a sigh. ``Our money is to eat with.''
Ortega told the crowd at the cathedral that the day was not about gifts. Perhaps the Christmas ban has had a positive side effect or two, he said.
The absence of public festivities has saved Cubans from the ``commercialization of Christmas,'' Ortega said and allowed them ``perhaps to have a purer Christmas.'' He urged Cubans to decorate their homes with nativity scenes, rather than with images of Santa Claus.
People were more excited about Pope John Paul's upcoming visit Jan. 21-25 than the officiality of one of the island's historically most-treasured holidays; in pre-Castro Cuba, about 80 percent of the population was baptized Catholic.
The Vatican now estimates there just over four million Catholic Cubans out of a population of more than 11 million.
For many of today's younger Cubans -- raised in an atmosphere that discouraged religion -- Thursday's holiday was nothing more than a day off. The capital's normally bustling streets were quiet, largely empty of their usual exhaust-belching buses, 1950s-era sedans and legions of bicyclists.
For some, it was all a bunch of hype about nothing.
``It was fine. We had Noche Buena dinner, but we have Noche Buena every year,'' said one Havana housewife who asked that her name not be published.
``For years, there have been Christmas trees and decorations everywhere, in all the stores and in a lot of homes,'' she said. ``Last year, we put garland around the doors and windows of the house. And the year before also.
``I don't know what's different. It seems the same to me. Same as always.'
Her mother-in-law said it was hard for her to celebrate wholeheartedly, because like many families, she misses most of her children, who live in Miami.
``We had dinner, a little conversation, and spent the time thinking about our family over there,'' said the woman, who asked not to use her name. ``Knowing they were having a much better time.''
Still for many, it created an atmosphere of hope, kindness and cheer -- a Christmas spirit not felt for many years.
Leonor, the dentist, said she didn't want it to end. She hoped the official holiday would be repeated.
``Who knows? Maybe they'll do it again next year.''
This report was supplemented with The Herald wire services.
Copyright © 1997 The Miami Herald