Neo-Gothic style building: The façade is elevated above a front portico with trefoil arches and enclosed between two bell towers ending in spires. The interior is in the shape of a Latin cross, with three naves and a transept, above which rises an octagonal dome.
**Description:** This is a fragment of the skin from the hands of the Saint, accompanied by an authentication dated April 14, 1994, signed by Father Agostino Gardin, Provincial Superior of the Franciscan Order of Padua. It was donated to the Sanctuary on April 16, 1995, by the Franciscans of Padua, who arrived in Reggio accompanying the traveling relic of Saint Anthony (see CARUSO 1996, p. 228). It is kept in a round metal case and displayed during the Saint’s feast day inside a golden reliquary.
**Date of entry into use:** 1995
**Relic:** Other
**Description:** A wooden statue depicting St. Anthony of Padua, still displayed in the presbytery: in the second half of the 1930s, it was donated to the sanctuary by Don Carlo Sterpi, the first successor of Don Luigi Orione. It replaced an earlier statue of the Saint, placed around 1924 in the first chapel erected in his honor on the Hill of Angels.
**Date of entry into use:** between 1934 and 1937
**Image:** Statue
**Original location in the Sanctuary:** Sacristy
**Type of ex-votos:** Painted or inscribed tablets, Jewelry, Photographs, Other
**Current preservation status:** Temporarily stored in a facility adjacent to the sanctuary.
On June 13, 1924, the Antonian Work of Calabria inaugurated a small institute for orphans and a chapel dedicated to St. Anthony of Padua on the Hill of Angels. The cornerstone of the new church building was blessed and laid on September 13, 1928. In July 1932, the Church of St. Anthony was recognized as a subsidiary of the Candelora Parish but was blessed later, on June 10, 1934, and elevated to a Sanctuary on August 15, 1937 (see CARUSO 1996, pp. 88-89, 102-107, and 129-131).
Don Angelo Bartoli, then director of the Antonian Work of Calabria, dated the final decision to build the sanctuary to February 15, 1933, the feast day of the Tongue of St. Anthony, miraculously preserved from the general corruption of his body (see CARUSO 1996, pp. 116-122). The current rector of the sanctuary, Don Alberto Alfano, considers the extraordinary drawing of lots—suggested by Don Orione to Don Bartoli in a letter dated September 8, 1927—to decide whether to dedicate the new temple to St. Anthony of Padua or to St. Prospero as more significant (see CARUSO 1996, pp. 114-115).
**1928:** Blessing and laying of the cornerstone.
**1932:** The Church of St. Anthony of Padua is recognized as a subsidiary of the Parish of Santa Maria della Candelora.
**1933:** Construction, suspended shortly after the laying of the cornerstone, resumes.
**1934:** The new temple is blessed and inaugurated by Monsignor Felice Cribellati, Bishop of Nicotera and Tropea.
**1937:** Monsignor Pujia signs the decree elevating the diocesan Sanctuary of St. Anthony of Padua.
**1943:** Aerial bombings cause incendiary fragments to fall on the sanctuary.
**1979:** Monsignor Aurelio Sorrentino, Archbishop of Reggio, establishes the Parish of St. Anthony of Padua.
**1995:** The Franciscan friars of Padua donate a relic of the Saint to the Sanctuary, authenticated on April 14, 1994.
**1997:** Solemn consecration and blessing of the temple presided over by Archbishop of Reggio Monsignor Vittorio Mondello; on the same occasion, the Archbishop deposits the relics of Saint Maria Goretti and the Blessed Luigi Orione and Gaetano Catanoso in the sanctuary.
In the sanctuary, a plenary indulgence can be obtained from 1934 every June 13 and from 1997 every June 8, respectively marking the feast day of the Saint and the anniversary of the solemn consecration of the temple.
On August 15, 1936, Archbishop C. Pujia issued the decree declaring the Church of St. Anthony of Padua a diocesan sanctuary.
The Church of St. Anthony, built on land donated to Don Orione in 1921 by Canon Salvatore De Lorenzo, parish priest of Candelora, was recognized in July 1932 as a subsidiary of that Parish, remaining so until 1979.
The Fathers complement the activities of parish pastoral care with dedicated support for the religious formation of pastoral workers and catechists.
The land in the Schiavone district, known as the Hill of Angels, where the sanctuary would later rise, was bequeathed to Don Orione by Canon De Lorenzo through a holographic will dated June 7, 1918. The Canon died in 1921 (see CARUSO 1996, pp. 79-81).
Via Trabocchetto II, 89126 Reggio Calabria RC, Italy
