Churches + Convents

Sermons in Stone: Quito’s Churches and Convents

Quito has been dubbed ‘The Reliquary of the Americas.’With some 40 churches and chapels, and 16 convents and monasteries with their respective cloisters in the Old Town alone, it’s easy to understand why. There are church towers, belfries and spires everywhere you look in the incredibly well-preserved historic centre. The great South American liberator Simón Bolívar called the city ‘a monastery’ when he rode in for the first time.

Quito’s churches and convents provide an enviable prism for visitors to observe the everyday faith of the city’s citizens as well as appreciating some of Ecuador’s most outstanding religious art and crafts. The Quito School of Art which flourished in the 17th and 18th centuries is alive and well in the aisles, cloisters, refectories, corridors and patios of the city’s great religious temples.

It only takes a little curiosity to discover a world which even many Quiteños don’t know exists…