Shrines around the World: Our Lady of Charity of Cobre, Cuba

by Gunther Simmermacher · January 31, 2026

Where’s that: In eastern Cuba, near the city of Santiago

Our Lady’s connection: Miraculous statue of Our Lady

Every year on September 8, the faithful throughout Cuba hold processions in honour of Nuestra Señora de la Caridad del Cobre, or Our Lady of Charity of Cobre, the patron saint of the island state.

The story of that devotion begins in 1612, when three youngsters in distress while out at sea prayed to the Blessed Virgin, whereupon the storm that had tormented them spontaneously stopped. Now on the calm sea, they saw what they thought was a little girl floating on the water. It turned out to be a small wooden statue of Mary, holding a smaller figure of the baby Jesus. On it was written, “I am Our Lady of Charity.” Remarkably, the statue was dry.

Kept in a chapel in the town of Cobre, near Santiago de Cuba, the statue became a popular destination of pilgrimage, and many miracles were attributed to Our Lady of Charity. From that chapel grew the present beautiful basilica. Today, almost every Cuban church (and many in the Cuban diaspora) has an altar of the Virgen de la Caridad del Cobre, often depicting the young people in a boat at her feet. A Cuban flag always hangs beside it. “Cachita”, as Our Lady of Cobre is affectionately called, is part of Cuban identity and culture, even as a popular motif of tattoos.

Devotees have included Fidel Castro’s mother and the author Ernest Hemingway, a Catholic convert, who donated his 1954 Nobel Prize certificate to the shrine. Popes John Paul II and Benedict XVI visited the shrine on their visits to Cuba in 1998 and 2012.

Published in the September 2025 issue of The Southern Cross magazine