Igreja da Venerável Ordem Terceira de São Francisco da Penitencia

This guide to the Venerable Third Order of Saint Francis of Penitence in Rio traces the brotherhood of prosperous merchants who founded the church in 1619 on a public vow of poverty and humility. It follows the decades-long, quarrelsome build that began around 1657, and the two Portuguese carvers who spent nearly twenty years covering the walls and ceiling in gold leaf. The order kept fighting with the friars next door, and with each other, over money and design, delays that stretched the project into the 1730s.