Cristo Re a Morena is a 21st century parish church at Via Scido 130 in the suburb of Morena, part of the Casal Morena zone and just to the east of Ciampino Airport. A picture of the church on Wikimedia Commons is here (beware, this photo is composed of two disparate shots which do not match).
.jpg){kind=link}
The dedication is to Jesus Christ as the Universal King.
History[]
This church is in the municipality of Rome, but belongs to the diocese of Frascati. The Rome diocesan boundary runs through the suburb, and the portion here has been called Morena Sud.
The locality when rural was served by the little country church of Natività di Nostro Signore Gesù Cristo a Casal Morena, which is now redundant. For some reason, when the parish was set up the first place of worship was not this but a basement in a property on the Via Casignana. The permanent church was completed in 1986.
Exterior[]
Basically, the church is a low cylinder in white concrete. The altar end has a shallow protruding apse with the same curve as the main body of the church, and the walls either side of this are also of slightly longer radius as far as the transverse cardinal points. Here are two recessed vertical window strips occupying the breaks in the side walls, and two more occupy the corners of the apse.
There is no façade as such. A flat-roofed accommodation and parish office block wraps around the left hand curve of the church, and also occupies the frontage past the near end of the major axis and to the right hand side. The entrance to both church and parish offices is in the end of this wing. To the right of the entrance, in between the door and the right hand window strip just mentioned, is a set of three identical narrow vertical rectangular windows. Two further identical sets are in the far curve of the right hand wall, before the apse. The left hand wall only has the one set of windows to the left of the apse.
There is a bronze relief of the risen Christ on the wall to the right of the entrance door.
The roof is virtually flat, with seven very low sectors. The three back ones are intruded upon by a large conical skylight made up of twelve sector panels.
Interior[]
The interior is simple, with white walls and the windows having coloured glass -a cross in blue on a yellow background. The roof is impressive, being in laminated pinewood with vertical plank rafters marking the sectors. The skylight over the altar is fitted with a curved tapering wooden cylinder focusing light on the altar.
The otherwise bare apse has a large crucifix. The altar itself is also in laminated wood.
Liturgy[]
Mass is celebrated:
Weekdays 17:30 (18:30 in summer);
Sundays and Solemnities 8:00, 10:30, 17:30 (18:30 in summer).