I'm spending most of my summer right here at Rome walking around this beautiful city and sometimes playing tour guide for visiting friends.  These are three of my favourite churches.

Santa Maria Sopra Minerva is very near the Pantheon and it is the only Gothic church in Rome.  It is named St. Mary over Minerva because it was built on the foundation of a temple to the Goddess of Wisdom, Minerva.  It dates from 1280.

As you come in you can see the smallest obelisk in Rome which Bernini placed on the back of a baby elephant (designed by Bernini and carried out by Ercole Ferrata)

Inside there is the "Risen Christ"--sometimes called "Christ the Redeemer"--by Michelangelo.  Or at least started by him.  It is a beautiful piece of sculpture aside from the incongruous, gravity-defying piece of bronze which was later added as a cover.

Santa Maria in Trastevere can be found in the heart of that charming neighborhood and is one of the earliest Christian churches in Rome.  One thing I find interesting about it is the mosaic in the apse which shows Jesus and Mary sitting side by side.  Jesus has his arm around Mary's shoulders. It is an unusual image and I'm sorry I didn't think to shoot it when I was there last week.

San Pietro is the last church we visited and it needs no further introduction.  Michelangelo's Pieta' is the most beautiful piece of sculpture I have ever seen in marble.