The church and convent of San Francesco

The church of San Francesco and the convent-former asylum of Controguerra were rebuilt between the 1920s and 1930s, on the site of an older Franciscan convent, which appears to have been founded in the years of preaching in Ascoli del poor man of Assisi. Probably the foundation of the Franciscan convent goes hand in hand with the loss of prestige, in the Vibratian area, of the Benedictines, who abandoned their monasteries. In fact, the foundation of the Franciscan convent of Controguerra was followed by the decline and abandonment of the monastery of San Benedetto al Trivio, which was reduced to ruins a few centuries later.

The first Franciscan presence in the territory of the Municipality is attested in the Acts of the General Chapter of Narbonne, drawn up on Pentecost of 1260. The convent is mentioned in the General Statistics of the Order written by friar Paolino da Venezia (1324-1344) and in the Liber Conformitatum of friar Bartholomew of Pisa (1385-1390).

After centuries of religious life closely linked to the historical events of Controguerra, the convent underwent the Napoleonic expropriations of 1809 and entered a spiral of decline. The building was sold to the Municipality which first made it a Bourbon barracks and after the Unification tried to use it as a public school, but without success. At the beginning of the twentieth century, the municipal administration thought of demolishing it, saving only the church, but this project also foundered. In the early 1920s, the entire complex was demolished and rebuilt, obtaining public schools in the area (the first classrooms were inaugurated in the 1920s) and a new church of San Francesco, with a more modest annexed convent (designed by the engineer Benedetto It was built and inaugurated in 1933), which for decades was also the country's kindergarten. An important restoration of the church was completed in 1982.

Today the church and the convent are completely plastered, without revealing the brick parts. The facade of the church is divided by four pilasters which rise from the plinth to the cornice, adorned with hanging arches which are interrupted at the points of contact with the pilasters. The roof is sloping and the bell tower, built on the left side of the apse, has a bell from the old convent. It bears the date "1828" and depicts the Immaculate Conception. The entrance has a round arched portal. In axis above the entrance there is a shaped rose window.

Inside, the church has a single rectangular nave, which culminates in a polygonal apse with two openings with windows adorned with artistic glass depicting San Francesco and Santa Chiara. The roof has two pitched trusses and the apse dome is frescoed with a starry sky. On the side walls there are round arches and four niches which house the statues of San Gabriele dell'Addolorata, of the Madonna degli Angeli, of the Sacred Heart of Jesus and of Sant'Antonio da Padova, once placed in the altar dedicated to the saint.

Of the altar of Sant'Antonio da Padova – formerly existing in the left aisle of the old medieval structure – the church also preserves a marble epigraph, which recalls the indulgence granted by Pope Benedict XIV in 1751. Inside the church there is it was also a statue of St. Francis, now located in the mother church, donated in 1952 by Francesco Crescenzi. Another statue of San Francesco, dating back to 1983, is placed in the small garden in front of the convent.

As for the premises of the convent, from 1933 until the first decade of the 2000s they housed the nuns and the kindergarten. Today they are used for various activities and a wing has been granted to the Istituto Musicale "Gaspare Spontini" of Ascoli Piceno, to install a detached section.