A new Catholic Church is awaiting construction in eastern Cuba, the first one to be built in the island country ever since the rise of Fidel Castro's regime in 1959.
The new church will be erected what is now a parking lot in the city of Santiago and will be a welcomed edition on an island where places of worship for Cuban Catholics are scarce, the BBC reported.
"The Catholic community is big here but they've never had a church," Fuasto Veloz, the project's lead engineer, told the BBC.
Catholics were banned from practicing their religion when Cuba was an atheist country. Baptisms were performed in secret and people attended mass in homes behind closed doors, according to the BBC.
After the revolution, Catholics were only allowed to repair the churches they already had. Many of the remaining churches were also destroyed by Hurricane Sandy in 2012.
Religious tides are changing in the now secular nation, with Communist Party members practicing their faith in the open. So far the new church has four out of five permits needed for its approval. Church officials are also hopeful they will secure the $250,000 needed to fund the project.
"I think this doesn't only show improving attitudes in Cuba to the Catholic Church, but to churches in general," Dionisio Garcia, the Archbishop of Santiago, told the BBC. "I think there's a better understanding of religious affairs."
Construction on the church will begin with 25 tons of scrap metal that's currently lying in a yard behind Our Lady of El Cobre, one of Cuba's most important Catholic establishments.
The scrap metal was the same used to construct a stage that Pope Benedict XVI spoke on during his landmark visit to Cuba in 2012.
"Re-using the metal means keeping alive the memory of something good for us Catholics," Veloz told the BBC. "It gives it new life, so it can serve future generations."
