Giovanni Battista Franzoni (8 November 1928 – 13 July 2017) was an Italian Christian communist and dissident theologian.

An abbot at St. Paul's Outside the Walls, one of the most popular churches in Rome, he was defrocked by Pope Paul VI, with whom he had feuded over theology, during the Cold War, after he had announced his intention to vote for the Italian Communist Party in 1976 Italian general election, which Franzoni had joined in June of that year.

[2] Franzoni was a longtime peace activist, having stood against the United States' armed involvements in Vietnam and Iraq.

[3] Franzoni opposed the initiated beatification process for Pope John Paul II.

In 2005, Franzoni joined ten other theologians to appeal to Catholics critical of the canonization process to voice their concerns.