On mission from God (or Peskin?) a San Franciscan lawyer is heading up efforts to build a nearly to-scale replica of the the Porziuncola, a Benedictine Chapel built in Assisi, Italy in 1209. This happening in North Beach, unsurprisingly— the $2.9 million construction project will stand within the National Shrine of St. Francis of Assisi, a building that said lawyer, Angela Alioto, was partially responsible for reopening in 1998. The reproduction will remain strikingly similar to the original, as a very, shall we say, fastidious Alioto has brought in not only Italian masons, fresco artists, and woodworkers who are closely following hundreds of photographs of the original, but also stones from the actual caves where St. Francis found his original construction materials. Curious but not Catholic? Rest easy: the Porziuncola reproduction will be open to all on September 27th.
· Porziuncola chapel re-created in San Francisco [SF Gate]
[image via National Shrine of Saint Francis of Assisi]