Dedicated to the most perfect love of God, with our feet in the street to serve our neighbour in all the corporal and spiritual works of mercy, without distinction.
The Congregation of Sisters of St. Joseph of Chambery, India, Private Limited belongs to a religious family whose beginnings go back to Le Puy, France, in the year 1650. There, in the midst of the misery left behind by thirty years of war, a Jesuit missionary named Jean Pierre Medaille gathered a small group of women who shared a compassion for their neighbours and a conviction that their own salvation, service to those in need, and proclaiming the glory of God were one and the same reality.
Father Medaille wished to form a new kind of religious community: a group of women who would profess simple vows, live in small groups, work to support themselves, have no property or social prestige, no patron, no external appearances or special works, and who would live and dress simply but in a manner appropriate to their circumstances.
That founding intuition still shapes our life in India. We live in small communities, we work alongside the people we serve, and we take up whatever the need of the hour asks of us — classrooms, clinics, hostels, villages and homes.
To live and proclaim the love of God by serving the dear neighbour without distinction, so that all may be one. Our mission is not defined by a single work but by a way of being present: attentive to the needs around us, and ready to respond with whatever we have.
A world moving towards unity and communion — where the excluded are received, the young are formed in dignity and conscience, the sick are cared for, and every person is helped to become what God intends them to be.
Across our provinces in India, the congregation's work takes shape in four broad areas of service.
The congregation's life and work in India is organised into four provinces — Pachmarhi, Nagpur, Nirmala and Tanmaya — each rooted in its own region, yet sharing one charism, one formation programme and one mission.
