Completed in 1605, the Basilica of Bom Jesus in Old Goa is India’s first minor basilica and one of the country’s finest examples of Baroque architecture, recognized as a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
The basilica is best known for holding the body of St. Francis Xavier, the Jesuit missionary who spread Christianity across Goa in the 1540s. His remains rest in an ornate silver casket gifted by the Grand Duke of Tuscany, displayed in a side chapel that draws pilgrims year-round; the relics are opened for public veneration roughly once a decade.
The church sits within Old Goa’s cluster of colonial-era churches and convents, making it easy to pair with a walk to the nearby Se Cathedral and Church of St. Francis of Assisi.
