Église Saint-Jean-Baptiste de Coyoacán, Colonial church in Coyoacán, Mexico

The iglesia de San Juan Bautista is a colonial church in Coyoacán with a facade of warm ochre and brown stone. A tall bell tower with arched openings and a domed top rises to the left, while two pointed stone buttresses flank the central section. Above the round-arched entrance portal, framed by paired columns, an inscription reads "AVE MARIA SINE LABE CONCEPTA." Inside, grey stone pillars support arches decorated with painted figures, and a large curved fresco fills the arch above the gilded altarpiece.

Hernán Cortés granted the land to Franciscan friars eight years after the conquest; on the site of a gold-decorated oratory the monks built the convent, church and orchard between 1522 and 1552. The church was rebuilt in 1804 and remodeled from 1926 to 1947, and was declared a Historical Monument in 1934.

The parish keeps the feast of Saint John the Baptist, its patron, and during Holy Week the rosary is prayed before the Santo Entierro in the Capilla de las Vírgenes, where the parish's statues of the Virgin are kept. The Capilla del Santísimo Sacramento, on the left, displays the consecrated host daily. The remains of María de la Luz Cirenia Camacho González, wounded in the 1934 shooting at the facade, are kept here and her beatification is under way.

The site is easy to reach since it sits near Plaza Hidalgo and is accessible via public transportation. The church welcomes visitors during regular hours and services.

The 1,991-kilo bell now hanging in the tower was cast by melting down the church's old bell, and among the works delivered after the 1926-1947 remodeling were 24 benches, six marble altars and a silver reliquary holding the hand of Saint Peter of Alcántara. The parish also keeps the remains of María de la Luz Cirenia Camacho González, shot at the facade during a 1934 anti-Catholic riot led by Tomás Garrido Canabal; her beatification process is open.