Saint Michele

Gorgeous

Gorgeous

The parish church of San Michele Arcangelo is the place where Abbot Joachim was baptized. An inscription of 1906, placed on the facade, reads: Sacra haec aedes erat ante anno 1100 in quo floruit Abb. Joachim Patritius, great earthquake concussa an 1905 restored Ap. Convincentius Granieri an. 1906. This inscription according to Gustavo Valente was repeated as follows within the choir: D.O.M. Tempum hoc longe ante decimum Nostrae Reparationis seculo celestis militie Principes erctum, in quo, regenerationis Sacramento abluti fuere Ioachim Abbas Florensis Sanctitate, Doctrina, et prophetia dono clarus. Today it is no longer visible and we do not know its dating but we know from Vincenzo Gervaise that, again in the choir, above the organ, the figure of Abbot Joachim was represented in relief. It has three naves with a basilica plan and a domed presbytery built where the ancient apse used to be. This last modification was certainly made after 1753, the year in which the drawing on the side was made. The old bell tower that must have been near the apse had already been rebuilt in the seventeenth century in front of the facade. On the ceiling a painting of 1787, the work of Cristoforo Santanna, depicting St. Michael, and on the altar an altarpiece depicting the Madonna dei Cieli with the Child in Glory and the Saints James the Greater and John the Baptist, by Dirck Hendricks, known as Teodoro D'Enrico il Flemish. There is also a wooden crucifix in the church dating back to around the 15th century. The patrimony of the church of San Michele also includes an ancient partially gilded blown glass chalice kept in the church from time immemorial and which, being made of glass, was thought to be datable to the 2nd or 3rd century AD. It is accompanied by a document that bears the following transcription: Calix iste vitreus - In hac decora ParoCHI Celicensi Ecclesia - Tanquam ipsius antiquitatis monumentum - servatur eius di grippe Calycibus in fourth jam - Nostre reparate salutis, seculo Romana Ecclesia tunc in libertate permanenti - In sacris faciendis - uti mos fuit. According to an analysis carried out by Giorgio Leone, it seems to be a chalice dating back to the mid-16th century. Particularly interesting is the fact that the analysis states that the chalice "received the liturgical destination". It is not, therefore, something else or a chalice that has never been used. The glass goblets were allowed by San Zeffirino or Zefirino, pope from 198 (or 199 for some) to 217 AD. We are in the pre-Constantinian era and Zephyrinus supported the Christological tendency of modalist monarchism against that of adoptionism or dynamist monarchism. The glass chalice was immediately forbidden by the following pope Urban I. If it were therefore of that period it would undoubtedly be of inestimable historical-artistic value. If, on the other hand, it was from a later period, or even from the sixteenth century, the mystery of a glass goblet produced, used and jealously preserved in an era in which it was not allowed would remain

According to tradition, the parish church of San Michele Arcangelo is the place where Abbot Gioacchino was baptized. An inscription of 1906, placed on the facade, reads: Sacra haec aedes erat ante year 1100 in quo floruit Abb. Joachim Patritius, great concussa earthquake an 1905 restored Ap. Convincentius Granieri an. 1906. The church probably existed in the years around Mille. The current appearance dates from after 1753, having been damaged by the earthquake of that year, and also reported damage during the earthquakes of 1832 and 1905. It has three naves with a basilica plan and a domed presbytery built where the ancient apse used to be. The old bell tower which must have been near the apse had already been redone in front of the facade in the 17th century.