Time.news – Five euros to enter the Pantheon. “In just three months we have come to define a goal based on common sense: to charge a modest ticket for the most visited cultural site in Italy. The citizens of Rome will be excluded from the payment”. This was announced by the Minister of Culture, Gennaro Sangiuliano, after the agreement signed today between the Vicariate of Rome and the Ministry of Culture which provides for the introduction of the entrance ticket to visit the Roman monument.
Entry that will be prohibited during religious services. “Today, Thursday 16 March 2023, at 12.30, in the headquarters of the Ministry of Culture, the new agreement on the Regulations for the use of the basilica of Santa Maria ad Martyres, better known as the Pantheon, was signed”, explains a long note from the Vicariate.
The agreement was signed by “the Ministry of Culture, represented by the Director General of the General Directorate of Museums and the Director of the Directorate of State Museums of the city of Rome, and the Chapter of the basilica of Santa Maria ad Martyres. The text provides for the payment of a ticket for the access of visitors to the Pantheon, which will be allowed only outside the hours reserved for liturgical functions and pastoral activities, so that the exercise of worship inside the basilica is safeguarded”.
Access to the faithful “for participation in religious and cult activities will be totally free and it will be the responsibility of the Ministry, through its employees, to prohibit access to visitors during the performance of these activities through special explanatory signs outside the door”. It will also be the responsibility of the Ministry “through its own personnel, arrange before each celebration for the positioning of cordons suitably placed in order to create an internal access corridor oriented only to the celebratory space, excluding the possibility of visiting the rest of the basilica. For the use of the basilica outside the hours reserved for religious functions and pastoral activities, the Ministry will regulate the orderly flow of visitors”.
The maximum price of the entrance ticket “is set at 5 euro – different categories of people will still be able to enter for free. The proceeds will be distributed as follows: 70% will go to the Ministry, which will bear the costs of ordinary and extraordinary maintenance and cleaning, also taking into account any requests for interventions that may come from the Chapter; 30% to the diocese of Rome, which will use it for charitable and cultural initiatives and for maintenance, conservation and restoration of state-owned churches present in the diocesan territory”.
The diocese of Rome, “considering the universal value and uniqueness of the architectural structure of the Pantheon to be peculiar, which over the centuries have made it a completely unique place of worship, necessarily open to a wide use also by scholars and researchers, agrees in the introduction of the entrance ticket”, adds the Vicariate.
Indeed, as stated in the Regulation signed today, “due to its singular history, Rome holds a unique artistic heritage, which flourished largely in the context of the experience of the Christian faith and the city is a destination for religious pilgrimages and knows huge flows of tourists and the Church of Rome, through its pastoral bodies, must also take care of the people who in Rome are looking for testimonies of authentic beauty and of a rich history with Christian connotations, but also indebted to other traditions and cultures”.