The birth of the sanctuary and the neighborhood of La Caridad

Old cities are a palpable accumulation of time, their houses an all-encompassing multiple mirror of what we are. For the citizens of the city of Camagüey, formerly Villa Santa María del Puerto del Príncipe, La Caridad tells of neighborhood, virgin and church.

In the beginning it was just an unpretentious chapel built by the side of the Camino Real, on the outskirts of the town. Nothing but a wish, until a miracle happened, they say, when Mrs. Juana de Varona, wife of Colonel Carlos de Bringas, begged Mother God for the joy of becoming pregnant, and it was granted.

Such was her gratitude that in return the wealthy couple paid for the construction of the Sanctuary of La Caridad, an effort that Diego Antonio de Bringas and his sister Doña Catalina, fruit of the blessing of the alleged miracle, eventually picked up years later until the works finished.

On September 8, 1734, a group of men riding white horses left in solemn march from the Major Parish in the old Arms Square at the head of a crowd, a ceremony that consecrated the church to house the cult of the Mother, and the building became the nucleus of the neighborhood that honors her with its name.
Thus the Villa's government and religious leaders moved the Blessed Sacrament and the image of the Virgin to their new enclosure on the other side of the Hatibonico river in the first procession of the Virgin of Charity in Port-au-Prince.

At dusk, the faithful would walk around the temple. The procession was led by slaves, followed by the most distinguished families. Centuries later, while the town had no more than 12,000 residents, Catholic devotees and those who also call her Oshún would do it together, and they say that most of them attended the ceremony and then enjoyed the popular celebrations around the place, where they danced, played games and bought food and drinks.

Since then, very humble families started to settle in the vicinity of the church. In fifteen years, according to historians, there were about 180 houses not far from the stately homes that the wealthy had built nearby. Therefore, little by little, the neighborhood began to distinguish itself from the crowded and strange physiognomy of the downtown streets.

Nowadays, each procession of La Caridad, with the peopl