Throughout the history of mankind, God always hears the cry of those who suffer the most. The roots of our congregation originated in the poorest part of Tamil Nadu where discriminations prevailed in the name of caste, religion, customs and beliefs which eventually lead to severe exploitation of the masses. Fr. John Aelen, a Mill Hill Missionary who was appointed as the parish priest at Vepery in 1881, with a prophetic and evangelical zeal, founded an indigenous congregation of the Franciscan sisters of St. Joseph on the 13 Feb 1883 with an insatiable thirst to emancipate the oppressed, the marginalised and alleviate the weaker sections of the hierarchically structured society. The congregation was established on 19 March 1887 at Vepery in Madras.