Igreja de Santo António dos Congregados, Porto

On Praça de Almeida Garrett, the Igreja de Santo António dos Congregados holds an extraordinary secret behind its church façade. The present church was built in 1703, replacing a chapel devoted to Saint Anthony that dated from 1662 and had been demolished shortly beforehand to clear the site. It was attached to the Convent of the Congregation of the Oratory.

Inside the Chapel of the Holy Family lies the tomb containing the richly dressed, mummified body of Pope Saint Clement, a martyr. He is the only pope buried outside the Vatican, and Porto historian Paulo de Souza Pinto identified him. The nineteenth century remade the chancel, while Acácio Lino supplied its wall paintings.

Let your eyes travel over the front: Jorge Colaço designed its tilework, and Robert Léone created the stained-glass windows in 1920. So this compact church gathers several layers of Porto’s religious art: an early eighteenth-century foundation, a nineteenth-century interior, and twentieth-century decoration—all with a pope resting in a chapel few passers-by would expect.