The Church of Santa Maria outside the walls or Santa Maria dell’Ospitale, also called Santa Filomena

Just outside the monastic precinct, in via Vittorio Veneto, there’s the Church of Santa Maria ouside the walls or Santa Maria dell’Ospitale, also called Santa Filomena, which can be easily spotted because of its portico with three arches on its facade.

This  charming building with a hospitale for pilgrims was founded in the XIV century on the land of the Abbey granted to a Fraternity of Flagellants that assisted the sick.

Enlarged and decorated in the seventeenth and eighteenth centeries, it was adandoned afterwards and eas used to lodge the troops who took flight after the battle of Caporetto (1917).

Renovated and re-consecrated in 2004, during the celebrations held in honour of Saint Ansel, it is structured as a wide, rectangular space which ends at the presbytery with an eighteenth century altar and contemporary fresco and is used also as a conference room.

On the left wall of the presbytery there’s a terracotta statue of the Black Madonna (Morenita) from Montserrat, gift of the citizens of Olesa de Montserrat (Catalonia, Spain), with whom Nonantola is twinned.