The Quarrel over the Halo

When the façade of the Jesuit church was finished in 1699, a stone figure of Saint Ignatius appeared at the top of it, surrounded by a heavily gilded metal glory. At this the secular clergy and the other orders grumbled that such a halo belonged, apart from figures of the Lord, to the Virgin Mary alone. The dispute was carried as far as Rome, but the Jesuits won — and so the statue stands on that picturesque façade to this day, and shows to best effect in the afternoon, when the sun lights it from the west.