Dr. Veguilla, who was a doctor in Havana, then spoke about his ordeal with the
bear and the firing squad. His medical training had prepared him to deal with a
wide range of emergency situations, but only his Christian faith had prepared
him for the terrible ordeal he suffered at the hands of Cuba's secret police.
Veguilla was arrested in Cuba on suspicion of being a CIA spy, and taken to a
local prison where officials tried to force him to reveal the source of Bibles
he was distributing in Cuba.
Veguilla's first shock came when he met his cellmate - a huge black bear. "When
I was inside the cell with the bear, I felt the Holy Spirit telling me to 'fight
the bear,'" Veguilla said. "I was ready to fight it but then I quickly felt like
Daniel in the Lion's Den. I knew that the same God of Daniel was also the same
one I had with me to protect me.
"When my heart calmed down a little, I noticed that the bear was very still and
chained up. However, I still thought he could reach me and finish me in one
second as I sat in a corner. The cell was very dirty with the bear's waste
matter everywhere and he smelled terrible. I sat quietly on the floor praising
God and amazingly the bear remained calm the entire time. The only explanation I
have is that God controlled him as I faced death in one of Castro's cells."
Veguilla said that his persecutors had stood near the door waiting for him to
scream out for them to open the door, but he had not done this.
Instead he said he continued to praise God in a low voice saying, "Lord, I
worship and glorify you."
Eventually, after several hours, he was freed from the cell only to face a worse
ordeal. "On the fourth day of being there, I was weak from several days without
sleep, but still I had a peace inside of me," he said. "Eventually the guards
came and took me several floors underground and we entered a small room. There I
saw two men who were screaming,"' They will kill us, they will kill us.'"
Veguilla knew that he was prepared to die for his faith and determined that
under no circumstances would he compromise his contacts. "They took the first
man away and I heard gun shots and screaming," he continued.
"I was next. I was taken to a room where there was blood on the floor. I was
tied to a large piece of wood on the wall."
Veguilla was asked if he wanted a blindfold, but he refused it. "I have to
confess that I was trembling and my heart was trembling," he recalled.
"Some men were then lined up and began aiming their guns at me. As they did I
began shouting, 'Cuba para Cristo!' 'Cuba for Christ!' I then said, 'You are
murderers, but God loves you. Cuba para Christo!' I then prayed, Lord, if this
is my time, Amen. I am ready to die.'
"Then I heard a voice say 'Fire' and I braced to receive the bullets, but all I
heard was the dull thud of the gun triggers going off. There were no bullets in
the guns and they all started to laugh. I later discovered that the other
'prisoners' were actually members of the secret police who had been dressed up
as prisoners as part of this elaborate and cruel hoax."
The interrogations continued for 47 days during which Veguilla was submitted to
other types of torture, such as being switched back and forth between
below-freezing and boiling-hot chambers, having to try and sleep with two
firearms aimed at his bed and misinformation concerning the state of his family,
as well as being awakened at all hours of the night for intense interrogation.
Unable to find any real evidence for a conviction, the authorities placed him
under house arrest for two years, which kept him from becoming involved in any
Christian activities. He was eventually freed.
After worldwide protests led by Open Doors with Brother Andrew and the Southern
Baptist Alliance, on September 15 of 1995 (his birthday) he was allowed to move
to the United States."
Author unknown. If anyone has a proprietary interest in this story please
authenticate and I will be happy to credit, or remove, as the circumstances
dictate.
Send by Tom tommytulsa@earthlink.net
(November 19th, 1999)
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