The Basilica of Santa Maria sopra Minerva is a minor basilica in Rome located in the Pigna district, Piazza della Minerva, in the vicinity of the Pantheon.
It was in the convent adjacent to the church that, on 22 June 1633, the father of modern astronomy Galileo Galilei, suspected of heresy, abjured his scientific theses to save his life from condemnation by the Holy Inquisition.
It is one of the very few examples of Gothic architecture in Rome. The basilica houses the remains of several important figures including Catherine of Siena, proclaimed Doctor of the Church in 1970 - co-patroness of Rome, Italy and Europe. She entered the Order of Penance of Saint Dominic and dedicated her whole life “to the honor of God and the health of souls.” She was dedicated to working for peace at a time of wars and fratricidal strife, and managed to convince Pope Gregory XI, who was then in Avignon, to return to Rome as bishop of the city (1377). Throughout her life she had an intense epistolary activity with popes, kings, queens, religious and common people, inciting everyone to live Christianly and follow God's will.
Catherine was able to carry out incisive action all the way to the highest authorities of politics and the civil and ecclesiastical institutions of the time in order to restore concord and peace among peoples; Catherine was also certainly not favored by her female status - remember that she lived in a time when women were little considered. Yet this young woman of such modest circumstances reached, in the short thirty-three years of earthly life she was granted, heights that still surprise us today. The Sienese saint can be considered the forerunner of Christian humanism bearer of a message that remains relevant and valid for contemporary mankind even today. A messenger of peace among the powerful, she stood up to kings and queens, governors and men of the Church, whom she simply asked to convert their hearts and put charity at the service of the good of all, as she wrote in all her letters, in which a strong morality and great spirituality are reflected. But more than anything else Catherine lived constantly in and of the fire of the Word, in this regard she had written, “In your nature, eternal Godhead, I will know my nature. And what is my nature? Inestimable love? It is fire, for you are nothing but fire of love”. Very devoted to Sant Catherine was Pier Giorgio Frassati (04/06/1901-07/04/1925), described by Filippo Turati as the “rich young man (who) had chosen for himself work and goodness. A believer in God, he confessed his faith with open manifestation of worship, conceiving it as a militia, as a uniform that one wears in the face of the world, without changing it with the usual garb for convenience, for opportunism, for human respect.” Pope John Paul II had called him “the boy of the eight Beatitudes”; protector of the youth of Catholic Action, he was a fervent lover of God and the Mountain. Along the aisles of the Church, on the occasion of the centenary of his death and to celebrate his Canonization on 3 August 2025, during the Jubilee of Youth, are excerpts from his letters and prayers.
