The current Church of Our Lady of Mount Carmel stands on the site of an older church that was located nearby. In the aftermath of the 1908 earthquake, the Pope of the time, Pius X, now a saint, donated two temporary wooden churches to the community of Scilla. One was placed in the Giardini Inferiore area and dedicated to Our Lady of Good Counsel, today Saint John the Baptist, and the other at the end of Via Umberto I and dedicated to Our Lady of Mount Carmel. Entirely made of wood clad with sheet metal, it had a bell tower and small roof cupolas for ventilation, while at the rear there was a small sacristy. The church housed the Congregation of Mary Most Holy of the Rosary. Originally composed of the wealthier members of the muleteers’ class, who, comparable to modern road transport companies, thanks to the mules on whose backs they carried goods for trade, managed to climb the social ladder through the proceeds of their work, rising to the rank of the upper bourgeoisie of Scilla and thus establishing close ties with the Ruffo family. The muleteers also supplied goods to vessels engaged in maritime trade and were responsible for distributing imported merchandise. They were so skilled in their work that they were contacted even from the upper regions of Calabria and Basilicata. These men, in addition to operating in the Church of San Rocco, were active, from the seventeenth century onward, in the Church of the Rosary, although the statute was officially approved only in 1779. This church was located in Piazza San Rocco and, having been severely damaged by the 1908 earthquake, was never rebuilt. The Confraternity continued to carry out its functions in this new location until the first half of the last century. The temporary church received furnishings belonging to three churches destroyed by the 1908 earthquake: the ancient Church of Mount Carmel, the Church of the Rosary, and the Church of San Marcellino. However, it still preserves the historical memory of a fourth church that no longer exists, that of Saint Louis Gonzaga. It was a private chapel owned by the D’Amico family, located at the end of Via Umberto I, then called Via San Marcellino, a short distance from the Church of Mount Carmel. For this reason, the Church of Mount Carmel is still called by the people of Scilla in local dialect “a cresia i Sant’Aloi,” the Church of Saint Louis. The wooden structure was demolished around 1970 when, following the start of construction work on the motorway, it became necessary to widen the road on which the church stood to allow the passage of heavy vehicles involved in the construction of the A3 motorway. At the end of the road where the church is located stood one of the construction sites. Once the Scilla section of the motorway had been completed, the church was rebuilt at the expense of the State and by the workers engaged in the construction of the A3. The State, however, completed only the basic structure of the building; therefore, it was necessary to provide the interior decorations and install the electrical and sound systems. A group of women from the neighbourhood formed a committee and began collecting donations, and thanks to these contributions the church was completed in 1974, the date inscribed beneath the majestic central iron door. Decorative works were carried out and the marble Eucharistic Altar was installed, whose altar stone contains a relic of Saint Victoria the Martyr. Today, the Church of Our Lady of Mount Carmel is the smallest church in the Parish of Scilla. The façade consists of a pronaos featuring on the front side an iron entrance door, unique in the entire area for its characteristics, created by the Scillese craftsman Pietro Martello, and in the upper part a tiled roof, all surmounted by a rose window and a Cross. To the left of the façade rises a small bell-gable housing two ancient bells recast in 1985. The church has a single nave. On the left wall is a processional Crucifix made of wood and bronze and, below it, at the rear, the ancient papier- mâché statue of Saint Paschal Baylon, while in the upper central section there is a painting depicting Our Lady of the Rosary of Pompeii. On the right wall, at the rear, there is a wooden confessional, while in the upper central section there is a painting depicting Our Lady of Mount Carmel. On both walls are engraved metal plaques depicting the Stations of the Cross. Finally, four rectangular windows are located in the upper part of the nave’s side walls, two on each side. The floor is composed of small rectangular slabs of light-coloured marble, while the roof is divided into three sections. In the two central sections are placed: a painted roundel depicting the Immaculate Heart of Mary, on the first beam, and another depicting the Sacred Heart of Jesus, on the second, both works by the Scillese painter Gullì and dating to the second half of the nineteenth century. From the centre of the two roof sections hang two circular glass chandeliers. The nave ends with the very ancient statue of Our Lady of the Rosary, displaying the characteristics of statues introduced by Spanish Dominican Friars in the seventeenth century, on the right, and with that of Our Lady of Mount Carmel, of the Lecce School from the first half of the twentieth century, on the left. The presbytery is raised by two steps. At its centre stands the Eucharistic Altar. Composed of two varieties of marble, brown marble and light marble, it incorporates in its shaft a silvered high- relief depicting the Holy Family. To the left of the presbytery is the celebrant’s chair. This chair, formerly belonging to the Church-Confraternity of the Most Holy Rosary, is made of finely crafted wood. On either side of the apse wall, the two doors leading to the sacristy are surmounted: the one on the right by a painting depicting Saint Joseph with the Child Jesus, and the one on the left by a painting depicting Mary Help of Christians, both provided with similarly finely crafted frames. At the centre stands an ancient wooden processional Crucifix with a red velvet curtain as its backdrop. On either side are matching lamps with metal structures and light-blue glass globes. Finally, the roof of the presbytery is composed of geometric stucco designs forming a frame around a rectangular wooden decoration created by joining together two doors that belonged to the old temporary wooden church.
Dottor Rocco Panuccio
