Saint Maria of Agonizzanti

Very suggestive

A Piece of History by Rosa Balistreri A woman who has learned to read after the age of thirty and who today is in fact enrolled in the register of "immaterial heritage of Sicily", in the chapter "Book of expressive practices and oral repertoires": the story of Rosa Balistreri, daughter of a a very poor family in Licata that has become a symbol of strength. "You can do politics and protest in a thousand ways - he said - and I sing". Among his most successful songs are "Cu ti lu dissi" (in the video) sung and sung by contemporary songwriters. But let's take a step back to understand where the fervor of Rosa Balisteri comes from: she is given in marriage, only sixteen, to Gioacchino Torregrossa and to the union Angela is born. Rosa will find out that her husband loses his daughter's trousseau to the game and attacks him with a file believing that he has killed him: he spends a good six months in jail after he joined the carabinieri. She works in a glass factory, as a picker and seller of snails, capers, prickly pears, sardines and as a maid: here, thirty-two, she learns to read and write. He falls in love with the son of the landlord and becomes pregnant: forced to flee, he spends another six months in prison because he is accused of theft. Once outside he finds work as a sacristan and guardian of the Church of the Agonizzanti in Palermo, living in a basement with his brother Vincenzo, an invalid. Not having succumbed to the priest's harassment, he is sent away and with Vincenzo they leave for Florence.

Splendid church in the historic center 20 meters from Via Roma. For many years closed and almost never open to the public. Now it seems that we can visit more regularly. It also organizes the evocative performances of Good Friday.

A beautiful church, run by the ancient confraternity that had the task of taking care of those condemned to death, and they wore the white habit. Built in 1630, it was renovated at the end of the eighteenth century by the architect Antonio Interguglielmi, after having been closed for twenty years, it was reopened in 2016. The visit on the occasion of 2019 treasure routes, was made exhaustively by one of the brothers. The Church contains works of art such as the stucco statues by Gaspare Firriolo and the frescoes by Elia Interguglielmi.