The monastery, named after a
Catholic title for
Mary as "
Mother of the Church" (), is located on the
Vatican Hill inside the
Vatican Gardens and near the
Aquilone fountain. It was founded by
Pope John Paul II in order to have a community of
nuns of an
enclosed religious order inside Vatican City, who were to pray for the
pope in his service to the
Catholic Church. This task was first entrusted to the
Poor Clares with the understanding that a different order of nuns would be invited to occupy the Monastery every five years. The building was erected between 1992 and 1994 in place of an administrative building of the
Vatican police. Its structure is incorporated into the
Leonine walls. The building is divided in two parts: The western chapel (two floors and rectangular in shape) and the eastern community rooms and
monastic cells (rectangular in shape and, on the Aquilone fountain's side, with four floors, with 12 monastic cells on the second and third floors, and a
refectory, store, kitchen, infirmary, archives and an office-studio on the ground and lower ground floors). Adjacent to the monastery is a fruit and vegetable garden. Pope Benedict XVI visited the monastery several times and celebrated
Mass for the nuns. After his retirement in February 2013, Benedict moved into the monastery on 2 May 2013. He lived there accompanied by a few assistants, with their domestic needs cared for by a small community of women belonging to a
secular institute called
Memores Domini, part of the
Communion and Liberation movement. He died there on 31 December 2022. ==Resident religious orders==