Chiesa Maria SS Monserrato

Ancient and beautiful church

Beautiful and evocative

Another well-kept church in Scigliano. I remember her from school. Now restored it is beautiful in its simplicity and historicity. Thanks to the attention of the parish priest.

A gigantic building that includes, beyond the Sanctuary of the Holy Virgin of Monserrato of the seventeenth century, also a former Vocationist Convent with an annexed former Gymnasium, now restored and transformed into a Reception Center for refugees and refugees. Equipped with numerous rooms and service, it also has WiFi connection. It should be noted that the relics of a martyr are preserved in the sanctuary.

The Church of Monserrato is located about 700 m asl, about 1 km above the town of Calvisi, which is the central hamlet of Scigliano. It can be dated to the end of the 18th century and was erected following a miraculous event. Admired the beautiful façade with tuff portal and tympanum and the low bell tower, which look west, to the Savuto Valley, you enter and you are struck by the fact that the interior, majestic, with 3 naves, is unfinished; in fact the plaster and the inlays start from the beautiful central altar, in polychrome marble and stucco, and reach about half of the church, then the pillars and walls are in rough masonry, also equally beautiful in its simplicity, made of stone and flakes. In the right aisle, the small bar with the remains of San Giustino, a Christian martyr. In the left one an ancient confessional, a green marble stoup with a pedestal and various statues of saints. The Church is part of a large complex, known as "Il Ginnasio", which was a center of culture and a point of reference for the lower Calabria, established in 1790 by the priest D. Giuseppe Arcuri. Until the 1960s it housed the Vocationist Fathers, the Middle School, a boarding school for students and is now used as a reception center for immigrants. The place is panoramic, a lookout over the Lower Savuto Valley that runs towards the mouth, in the Tyrrhenian Sea, and at sunset the silhouettes of the Aeolian Islands are visible. A few tens of meters away, the monumental cemetery of Scigliano. The festival is celebrated on the second Sunday of July and is very much felt by the faithful and there is also a fair with many exhibitors. As a child, I remember that in this fair some farmers sold prickly pears and peeled them live with their bare hands, regardless of the thorns and then also sold the first tomatoes.