The Church of St. Francis of Assisi, located on Piedmont Street, was born as a parish forming part of the La Vega district in 1952, while as an architectural structure–designed by engineer Marco Piloni (Rome)–it was built starting in 1957 and inaugurated in 1963.
Wanted and officiated by the Friars Minor Conventual, it was created in ideal continuity with the much better-known Gothic church of St. Francis of Stampace, which arose starting in 1274 and became for centuries a center of culture (with the adjoining Conventual Studio) and spirituality (through liturgy, church groups such as the Franciscan Third Order, and art wanted there as an easy means of transmitting the Christian faith and evangelical-Franciscan feeling).
Collapsed in 1875, the artworks were acquired by the state and today are mostly kept in the National Picture Gallery in Cagliari.
The modern Church of St. Francis, because of its square plan structure and slightly elevated but diaphragm-free chancel, liturgically realizes the family unity between the assembly of the faithful and those who preside over it.
At the same time it invites elevation to beauty and faith through the artistic artifacts it houses, which are of two orders: sculptural and mosaic. By Aroldo Bellini (Rome) are: the bronze statue of St. Francis (façade); the crucifix (high altar); the fourteen Stations of the Cross; in marble the delicate statues of St. Bonaventure, St. Clare, and the graceful Angels in adoration of the Eucharist or singers with sheet music in their hands (high altar). By the Sicilian artist Franco D’Urso (Catania 1900 – Cagliari 1989), on the other hand, are the various mosaics made to designs by Perugia architect Gina Baldracchini: Holy Trinity and hagiographic cycle of St. Francis (apse wall) 1962; St. Heart (right altar) and Immaculate Mother of God and the Church (left altar) 1966.
