The Order

Our Hospitaller Order is present day in 51 countries in all five continents, with 396 Apostolic Centres.

We have received as our legacy the Charism of Hospitality, we devote ourselves as our mission, following the example of our Founder, to the sick and to those who are suffering. In the way we live and act we manifest our spirituality.

Our dedication to the suffering covers both health care and welfare. Within the Church we define ourselves as a mendicant Order, and we try to work by displaying an attitude of charity to those who need it.

We are present in different countries, within the government organisations providing different services, so that in all we do we work together with the Health and Welfare Ministries and other civil organisations and local authorities etc.

We are present in countries with the greatest needs, where the Order's Centres are run, based on the principle of subsidiarity and driven by the missionary spirit, making up for the local shortcomings in the field of health care and welfare through the Centres we have promoted.

We serve the sick in general, and the mentally ill. Recently we have them a great deal to establish units to provide palliative care and to nurse AIDS sufferers', Alzheimer's patients etc.

We also have Centres for the mentally impaired, the physically disabled, the elderly, the homeless, and run programmes for persons suffering from hard drug-dependency, etc.

In addition to the Brothers, we have 63.076 professional co-workers incorporated to our mission with an employment contract, and another 23.049 volunteers as well as an army of benefactors who have faith in a project, and support us by providing us with resources.

With our personnel and volunteers we endeavoured to share the criteria according to which we strive to perform our mission, and our values and institutional project, respecting the identity of every individual.

Being present in such widely differing societies, drawing on our identity as Catholic Centres we also endeavour not only to treat or rehabilitate our guests, or to accompany them in their state of sickness or marginalisation, but also to foster evangelisation by spreading the good news that Jesus Christ brought to us through our words, but above all through our lives. The primary way we evangelise is by welcoming in everyone, as they are, and play a part in the process of drawing close to Jesus Christ and His Church, in the quest to find a meaning for their lives.

We consider ourselves, in an increasingly more secularised world, to be the expression of the Church of Charity.