The Baezano convent of San Antonio breathes calmly and, with it, the rest of the World Heritage City: a little over a year after its inception, the rehabilitation works of the roof and the façade, whose condition had been completed, have been completed. In check the stability of the temple, built in the 15th century. This happy ending has been possible thanks to the three-way agreement signed by the Baeza City Council, the Bishopric of Jaén and the Caja Rural de Jaén in July 2019, which involved the renewal of a collaboration agreement signed for the first time in 2011 and that had been renewed every two years. The great novelty of that 2019 renovation was that the agreement included the rehabilitation of the infrastructure, a large-scale project drawn up by the Baeza City Council and with whose expenses the Caja Rural de Jaén paid one hundred percent.
The bishop of Jaén, Amadeo Rodríguez; the president of Caja Rural de Jaén, José Luis García-Lomas, and the mayor of Baeza, Lola Marín, visited the temple, where they were received by the Poor Clares sisters, to enjoy the results of the works. “We had a problem in the convent, the roof was falling down and the facade was in danger of opening. Now all this has been solved thanks to the works already completed, which have been a marvel, ”said a satisfied mayor of Baeza, who added that it has also been used to carry out other conservation and maintenance tasks. Marín praised the work of the architect responsible for the project, Jesús María Martín Clabo, and the “important” investment by Caja Rural to make the emergency intervention in the temple possible. “I have no words to thank what they have done, especially to its president, Mr. José Luis García-Lomas, who has been the soul of this project”, whose works began at the beginning of last year, but suffered delays due to the forced stop during the first state of alarm to combat covid-19.
For his part, the bishop of Jaén highlighted “the collaboration and effort” of all the individuals involved in the rehabilitation of the convent and of the entities that have made it possible. “It is an intervention in favor of the temple, but also of the heritage of Baeza, because it is part of its history,” said Rodríguez. Finally, García-Lomas appreciated “the magnificent result” of the works and announced that the next project to be carried out in the convent with financing from Caja Rural will be the arrangement of the cells of the Poor Clare mothers.
HISTORY. The recently restored convent, dedicated to San Antonio de Padua, is occupied by the Order of the Poor Sisters of Santa Clara. As reflected by Francisco de Cózar Martínez, in his work “News and Documents for the History of Baeza”, from 1883, the temple was built in 1409 to be used by cloistered religious. At that time he was a layman from San Diego de Alcalá himself. The nuns still keep the stone mortar that was then used in kitchen work. The religious remained in the convent until 1493, when they were transferred to other monasteries due to the reform carried out by the Catholic Monarchs. When the convent of San Antonio was deserted, and before the ruinous state of the temple of Santa Clara, the Franciscan Poor Clares sisters requested the transfer to the convent of San Antonio, which they began to occupy at the end of the 15th century.
The temple made the news in October: all the sisters tested positive for covid
The convent of San Antonio de Baeza made the news last October in relation to the covid-19 pandemic: on the 7th of that month, the ten sisters that make up their community tested positive for coronavirus. Two of them began to present symptoms compatible with the disease, so a doctor was notified to carry out the relevant tests. The results were as mentioned: all the sisters had contracted the virus. The convent had hydroalcoholic gel dispensers and a mask was used inside it; In addition, the sisters had been separated from the faithful by a fence, so the case raised many unknowns about the causes of the infections. As a result of this circumstance, both the services and the visits to the temple were suspended. At that time, the incidence rate for every 100,000 inhabitants of the virus in Baeza was 378.8, with 60 confirmed cases in the 14 days prior to October 7, of which 35 were registered in the previous seven days. For this reason, the mayor of Baezana, Lola Marín, called for “responsibility and calm” in the face of the increase in infections in the municipality.
ON SUNDAY, THE INAUGURAL MASS
This Sunday, at five in the afternoon, the bishop of Jaén, Amadeo Rodríguez, will officiate a special mass in the convent of San Antonio de Baeza on the occasion of the official inauguration of the restoration of the temple. The religious appointment will be the finishing touch to the emergency intervention completed in the temple to solve structural problems in the
deck and on the
facade.
– .
