Vatican City State, Past and PresentIt is very vivid in everyone's memory the first public Mass that Pope Francis celebrated on March 17, 2013 at the beginning of his pontificate and that, leaving the church of St. Anne, he greeted hundreds of people who were in the street on the Italian side, surprising and leaving disoriented the gendarmes in charge of his security.
This church with its elliptical floor plan takes its name from the confraternity of the "Palafreneri pontificii", who in 1378 chose the mother of the Virgin Mary as their patron saint.
History of the Church of St. Anne of the Vatican
Its construction was decided in 1565 and the project was entrusted to Giacomo Barozzi, called "il Vignola". It was inaugurated in 1583, and the temple, which contains precious marbles, was finished during the year 1700, when the facade, the dome and the internal frescoes were realized.
Although its origins are secular, the ".Pontificia Parrocchia di Sant'Anna in Vaticanowas officially instituted on May 30, 1929, by Pope Pius XI, with the Apostolic Constitution "The Church in the Church". Ex Lateranensi pactThe administration of the church was entrusted to the Augustinian religious. They are also currently in charge of it, and its current pastor, Father Mario Milliardi, will celebrate his golden jubilee of priesthood in the year 2023.
A 100-year-old parish priest
Father Gioele Schiavella, parish priest from 1991 to 2006, speaking to Omnes, recalls that "the Augustinians who were in Castel Gandolfo were called here by Pius XI", which is why "this church - today under the care of the Salesians - retains the name of an Augustinian from the time of the Council of Trent: St. Thomas of Villanova".
Father Gioele, at 100 years of age, celebrates Mass daily, administers the sacraments and jokes about his age: "in spite of it, I can't become an ornament". He points out that, except for the sacraments administered inside St. Peter's Basilica, "all the pastoral work that takes place in the Vatican territory takes place in the parish of St. Anne, including the sacraments administered by the chaplains of the Swiss Guard or the Vatican gendarmerie. And he comments with great naturalness something that has not reached the media: "Two days ago Pope Francis was here, he visited us, invited by an association".
At the time of "Papal Rome", on July 26, on the occasion of the feast of St. Anne, expectant mothers took part in a procession that started from the church of Santa Maria in Portico in Campitelle (near Piazza Venezia) and went to where the church of Sant'Anna in Vaticano is today, with an image on a platform that today is in the church of Santa Caterina della Rota. In front of them were the pallbearers on horseback and, when they crossed the bridge over the Tiber River, the cannons of Castel Sant'Angelo could be heard.
Church architecture
On the central altar of the church is the painting of St. Anne with the Child Virgin, painted in 1927 by Arturo Viligiardi. In reality it was to house the oil painting of the Madonna dei Palafrenieri by Caravaggio, which was commissioned on October 31, 1605 by the Confraternity of the Palafreneri, which later became the Confraternity of the Sediari. The commissioners did not like the painting, so they ended up selling it to Cardinal Scipione Borghese, which is why it is now in the Borghese Gallery.
This small church is a true architectural jewel, beautiful to visit but also to pray and ask for the intercession of Saint Anne, as the faithful do every year on July 26th.
You can also participate in the novena to the Virgin Desatanudos in October, or see a small replica of the Virgin of the Snows, the patron saint of Costa Rica, on her altar on the left. Or, simply visit her any day tourists and pilgrims are in the Eternal City.
