BLESSED SERVILIANO (SPIRE OF MILANESE PEOPLE)

07 NovemberSpire along the South walkway-G63

To date there is only one theory of the attribution that witnesses this statue associated with the figure of Blessed Serviliano, as studies have still not established it with certainty. It is most likely the Saint and Martyr who lived in the first quarter of the 19th century and, consistently with the story of Blessed Serviliano, he was a humble charitable youth, a jovial extrovert. Of Spanish origins and grown up in a religious family, in the 1930s Serviliano was preparing for priesthood when, on 22 July 1936, he was imprisoned with all his brothers of the Pozuelo community, in the same convent where he was studying. The three-year period 1936-1939 is, in fact, remembered as a period of suppressions and of martyrdom in the Spanish Church. The statue we admire today was placed on Spire G63 in 1953 and, observing the facial features, it portrays a young man only attired with a robe that leaves the right shoulder and part of the left leg bare. His gaze looks downwards, while he intensely observes the joint hands that hold the crucifix, as if the Blessed were praying in silence, at the solemn moment of devotion that precedes his martyrdom.