From 1351 to 1554, the church was known as San Giovanni Evangelista, since the site had a small oratory dedicated to the saint.

In the mid-16th century, Cosimo I applied the inheritance of a Giovanni di Lando of the neighboring Gori family to the erection of a church for the newly arrived Jesuits (1557).

The Jesuit Order was suppressed in 1775, and the church was passed to the Piarist or Scolopi Fathers.

The ceiling was frescoed (1665) by Agostino Veracini[clarification needed] and stucco statuary designed by Camillo Caetani.

It also has frescoes by Alessandro Fei (il Barbiere) and canvases by Jacopo Ligozzi, a St. Francis Saverio preaching to natives by Francesco Curradi, and a Christ and the Canaanite in the second chapel on left by Alessandro Allori.