ABSTRACT
The axiom of the Order, ‘Service of the Poor and Defenders of the Faith’ embodied the whole philosophy of what the Hospitallers stood for: it enshrined the two main Christian commandments of love, devotion to God and fellow human beings. Their passion for the Faith was reflected in the care they lavished on their Hospitaller churches, on the construction of new places of worship, and on the expensive endowments they bestowed on them. This section deals with the two churches of the Messina priory in the seventeenth century and how the refurbishment and reconstruction of the older church into the new one, brought to light long-forgotten relics which augmented the prestige of this Hospitaller Order.
