Santa Prassede

gracialynne, you really need to use the internet as it's almost always going to be your best resource. Hours can change after someone has visited, even if they've done so fairly recently.

I'm seeing hours daily at:

7:00AM - 12:00PM and 3:00PM - 6:30PM
(the church's own page):
https://santaprassede.wordpress.com

Or....

07:00 or 07:30 - 12:00pm and 4:00pm - 6:30pm

You should be fine if you arrive anywhere between 7:30 and noon or 4:00 - 6:30

Wonderful, Kathy! Thanks so much.

Good to know. When a woman posted in my other thread that she found Maria Maggiore closed during the hours it was posted on the Internet that it was supposed to be open to the public (on her several visits to it) I wondered how accurate the Internet postings are. But I hope you are right, and that most of the info on the Internet regarding hours of various sites is up-to-date and accurate.

Planning a successful trip is sure a lot of work, and I appreciate all you have done to help. What I'm going to do now is go through and write all of the info in a little book I can carry with me, so I don't have to go through old postings or rely on devices which might get stolen or have batteries go dead. I want everything easily accessible at my fingertips. Someone in this group suggested this earlier, and I think it's a really good idea.

The thing is, nothing is ever 100% certain whatever is printed or whatever someone who has been there recently might say. Churches can temporarily close for special services or repairs, museum personnel might go on strike, a security concern might shutter an attraction abruptly, etc. You do your best and have to roll with the punches if something doesn't work out as planned.

I think fairly often, churches are staffed by volunteers, which may make their hours a bit less reliable than those of museums and more commercial sights. I ran into that problem myself in Marseille.

The best rule of thumb is that the places you would be saddest to miss should be visited as early during your visit as possible, just in case something goes wrong. But there are so may wonderful places in Rome, as elsewhere in Italy, that if you run into an occasional unexpected closure, you will still have a great trip.

Good points, Kathy and Acraven. I think that's right about churches being staffed mainly by volunteers. When I was in Wales in late April, my friend and I went exploring a country church in Chepstow, St. Mary's, I believe it was, in the early afternoon. We had taken a train to this town and were on foot... Interesting little cemetery, adjacent. We noticed repairs were being done on the building, but there was a sign, saying "Open," with an open door, so we thought it was open to the public. It was a fascinating church, with old-fashioned Welsh figures in high bonnets on the walls, and we spent quite a bit of time browsing. We signed the guestbook, and picked up some literature. When we were leaving, we noticed the door was closed, and it didn't open. That's right. It was locked! After a bit of panic, I thought to look at the literature, and it mentioned a cell Bible Study group with a contact phone number. Luckily, my friend had a phone, so we called that number. The lady was home and very apologetic and came over and unlocked the church and invited us to her home for tea and to meet the pastor. Thank goodness for that literature. She thought a construction worker had probably left the door open to use the restroom and had locked us in, not realizing anyone was in the church, as it is a small country church. This is one of my favorite memories of our explorations of Wales. We really enjoyed getting to meet some of the locals. They could not have been any more hospitable.

Very kindly, you'd do much better to focus on THIS trip and not recap those you've taken before and have little relevance to what you're trying to accomplish next month.

You'd be a lot less nervous and confused - as you've stated that you are - and be able to keep track of the considerable amount of info you've asked for and received by concentrating only on the tasks at hand. :O)

Make sure you have some 1€ coins when you go. The interior of the church is quite dark. You can put money in a machine to turn the lights on for a brief time. They are not very bright, but without them you can see nothing of the mosaics they illuminate, which are the ones behind the altar.

Don't expect a fancy exterior. This church is all about what's inside.

Be sure you have coins for the lights inside Santa Prassede. You might also like San Clemente, if it's not on your list yet - several levels of construction reveal two Christian churches and one Mithraeum on the bottom level.

Regarding Kathy's comment, I think some of your anecdotes would be great as trip reports - and would not confuse people who offer advice.

Regarding Kathy's comment, I think some of your anecdotes would be
great as trip reports - and would not confuse people who offer advice.

Exactly. :O)

In addition to Santa Prassede (and its amazing little Chapel of San Zeno inside), if you're interested in early Christian mosaics in Rome, you might want to check out this map I created in Google Maps:
https://tinyurl.com/RomeMosaicChurches

My source for the churches was this site: http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Gazetteer/Places/Europe/Italy/Lazio/Roma/Rome/churches/home.html
Scroll down to "ROMAN CHURCH MOSAICS OF THE FIRST NINE CENTURIES," researched in 1906.

Thanks for the San Clemente tip, Zoe, and thanks for the great map, Michael!