Santuário Dom Bosco

What makes it special

Eighty concrete columns, each 16 metres high, give the church its Gothic outline. The architect Carlos Alberto Naves designed it, and from outside it looks like a sober concrete building.

Between the columns, every wall is filled with glass made in São Paulo by the Belgian artist Hubert Van Doorne. From the nave, the glass gives the impression of a starry sky.

Over the centre of the nave hangs a chandelier of Murano glass, designed by the Brazilian architect Alvimar Moreira to stand for Christ as the light of the world. It is not always lit, so look up as you come in to see whether you have caught it on.

The twelve bronze doors by Gianfrancesco Cerri show the life of Dom Bosco, the Italian priest who in 1883 dreamed of a great civilisation where Brasília now stands. The church was raised in his honour.

Visiting

Free and unticketed, the church is open to walk into during its daily hours. Walk the length of the nave slowly; close to the walls, the blue breaks up into thousands of separate pieces of glass. Then stand under the chandelier at the centre and look up at it against the glass.

This is a working church with Mass every day. Outside Mass times you can photograph the interior and the exterior. During Mass, put the camera away and sit quietly at the back or step outside.

Tips

Near sunset, light comes through the side windows in shafts, so a second visit late in the day shows the church another way. Pair it with the morning and you see the nave at both ends of its light.

The Ermida Dom Bosco is a different place: a separate chapel in a park on the shore of Lake Paranoá. Check which of the two you mean before you set off.