MIAMI — Months after Miguel “Mike” Fernandez celebrated his 12th birthday, armed members of Fidel Castro’s militia frightened him and his 10-year-old sister when they interrupted Christmas Eve dinner at their home in Manzanillo, then known as the Pearl of the Guacanayabo.
The men carrying submachine guns forced them and their parents, Lieba and Mario Fernández, to leave their home and their island for Mexico City. He eventually made his way to the University of New Mexico, served in the Vietnam War, got a job as a door-to-door salesman -- and became a billionaire healthcare mogul.
The MBF Healthcare Partners chairman and philanthropist recently marked his 73rd birthday. After years of advocacy, he has cemented his position as a vocal advocate for hard-working and entrepreneurial immigrants in need of refuge and access to the American Dream.
“Immigrants are not as welcome as they used to be,” Fernandez said on Friday.
It’s a concern that Miami Archbishop Thomas Wenski, who was born in Palm Beach to first-and-second generation Polish immigrants and served the Haitian-American community as a priest in South Florida, shares strongly.
“We should see them not as threats, but we could say maybe strangers, but strangers that should be embraced as brothers and sisters,” Wenski said.
To share a message about the need for Christian empathy and compassion, the two advocates for migrant rights met on Friday in Miami’s Coconut Grove with Timothy Schmalz, a prominent Canadian sculptor who has been inspired by lessons learned from the Bible.
Schmalz, whose works are on display at historically significant Christian sites around the world, is best known for “Homeless Jesus,” which depicts Jesus Christ sleeping on a park bench. Matthew 25:40 -- “Whatever you did for one of the least of these, brother and sisters of mine, you did for me” -- was the inspiration.
The Miguel B. Fernandez Family Foundation commissioned two sculptures by Schmalz. He decided to display them at a place rich in symbolism and history for generations of Catholic Cuban exiles, who have supported and prayed for the dissidents who have been imprisoned or killed on the communist island.
The meeting was at the National Shrine of Our Lady of Charity to unveil bronze replicas of “Angels Unaware,” a sculpture depicting a boat with migrants on a voyage, and “Be Welcoming,” a sculpture depicting an angel as a pilgrim resting. Hebrews 13:2 -- “Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for thereby some have entertained angels unawares” -- was the inspiration for both.
“It shows us, or it teaches us, that we all have to treat each other with kindness,” Schmalz said.
The sculptures were steps away from a stained glass window facing Biscayne Bay, where many have prayed for the desperate refugees who have perished at sea in the Florida Straits. Wenski said the “Angels Unaware” sculpture for him was about solidarity.
“This is a way of bringing attention to the fact that we are on the same boat,” Wenski said.
Fernandez, Wenski, and others took photographs with the sculptures outside the Marian place of worship, better known in Spanish in Miami as La Ermita de la Caridad. The sculptures were also steps away from a replica of La Virgen de la Caridad del Cobre, or Cachita, the patroness of Cuba since 1916, at the national shrine in El Cobre, a town in eastern Cuba.
Fernandez said the “Angels Unaware” sculpture felt personal and said, “Those people in that boat today are really us.”
Fernandez has used visual communication to advocate for undocumented migrants and refugees before. He funded a campaign against Republican Cuban-American politicians who didn’t take a strong stance against President Donald Trump’s mass deportations, including State Secretary Marco Rubio and U.S. Reps. Carlos Gimenez, Maria Elvira Salazar, and Mario Diaz-Balart.
Salazar, who was born in Miami to Cuban exiles, toured Alligator Alcatraz, a detention center for migrants that Gov. Ron DeSantis pushed for on a remote Miami-Dade County-owned property in Collier County, and said it was up to standard. Trump had toured it too and approved. Fernandez had a message for the politicians.
“When we gave you funds for your campaigns, you gave us your word that you were going to be our voice in Washington -- they haven’t been,” Fernandez said about the message of the campaign, which he plans to continue.
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