Church of San Francesco di Paola

San Francesco di Paola (1677-1727) stands in Piazza Indipendenza and the façade in its essential lines insists on a steep square from which a flight of steps starts which connects with Via Dei Mille. The history of the Church begins on November 20, 1676, when the holy Congregation of Cardinals authorized the General dei Minimi to found the Convent of San Francesco di Paola in Vittoria by a decree. With an act of March 3, 1677, the Jurors of Vittoria assigned a body and two earth mounds for the construction of the convent, but once the foundations were completed, the works were abandoned to be resumed in the place where today stands the Church of San Francesco di Paola. The Convent was completed around 1727 and the Decurioni (the Council of City Administrators) assigned the convent twenty ounces per year with the obligation to create and maintain a grammar school in Vittoria. In 1732, five years after the Convent, the church was also completed on the initiative of Father Francesco Gatto dei Minimi, and the Confraternity of San Francesco di Paola was built. The Convent was later destroyed, while the church was decorated by Paolo Cappellani of Palazzolo Acreide, under the rectorate of Father Giombattista Giudice. or Acreide. After being abandoned during the First World War, it was rededicated and reopened for worship in the following years and, in 1956, it was elevated to a parish. In 1956 it was elevated to the dignity of a parish.

The church has undergone great transformations especially in the naming of the altars and does not preserve the original devotions. Next to the altar of San Rocco, you can admire a fresco depicting San Francesco di Paola using his cloak as a boat to cross the strait. The statue of the altar of the Virgin was made by Rosario Converso, a Victorian artist. While the recently restored pulpit presumably dates back to the XNUMXth century. The statue in wood and plaster of San Francesco di Paola, of the main altar was made towards the eighteenth century. Several frescoes adorn the walls. The walls of the presbytery find various frescoes and paintings of particular artistic elaboration. (Text source: Municipality of Vittoria)