INDIA

Barasat Community

The Helpers’ house of Barasat welcomes girls who come to us to discern their vocation, whether they are called to the Religious life as Helpers. The four sisters that are at their service offer them different opportunities to help them grow as women and as Christians: an important support to their formal education, a solid base to develop their English fluency, psychology counselling, faith knowledge sessions, formation in spirituality, experiences at the service of the poor, a general introduction to the Congregation and its Charism..... Beside this main activity, the sisters of Barasat community are also involved in other important missions: Alternative Medicine, Pastoral services in the local Parish, activities for the children of daily laborers, families' visits...

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Substation of Sariakata (Bankura)

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Since 2021 two sisters from Barasat community are serving in the village of Sariakata, in Bankura district, 250 km from Barasat, where the Helpers run a Tuition Center and a service of Alternative Medicine (Herbal Medicine and Reflexology) for the rural people of that area.

All the activities are carried out along with and at the pace of the local people who take an active part in them.

Every day from Monday to Friday, around 60 children and kids aged between 3 and 16 years attend the classes that are held from 7am to 9am and from 3.30pm to 5.30pm. Every Saturday afternoon, sports and various games are organized for them in the external spaces surrounding the village.

Oikatan Community
(Kolkata)

Oikatan community is mainly welcoming young sisters who are studying or involved in different trainings meant to develop their professional and cultural formation. At the same time there are also senior sisters involved in different missions through professional works. Among the four Helpers living in Oikatan, there is an accountant working at the Seva Kendra (Caritas) of the Archdiocese of Calcutta, a psychologist especially counselling Youth and Women coming from underprivileged contexts, a newly professed sister studying BA in Psychology. This is the community where the Group superior lives.

Progoti Community ( Kolkata)

Among the two sisters living in Progoti flat, in a building where other eight families are residing, one is a teacher working with children with special needs in a School run by Christians Brothers: she is also offering ongoing formation sessions to the young teachers of the Tuition Center in Sariakata. The other sister is studying to achieve an MA in Psychology. They are occasionally cooperating with the local Parish.

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Bolpur Shantiniketan Community

The famous village where the Nobel prize Rabindranath Tagore founded his University (Viswa Bharati), still draws so many students coming from all over India and from abroad. There the Helper sisters were invited in 2010 by the Bishop of Asansol Diocese to open a Study House for tribal girls, in order to promote their education and empowerment.

At present, five Helpers are at the service of the girls who study in class XI and XII, in Government schools, sharing their simple life with them. At the same time, the sisters give the girls opportunities to learn some skills that may be supportive in their future: they learn Tailoring and gardening very eagerly!

The sisters are also involved in various missions and different fields, like serving as the bursar of the Indian communities, studying (MSW), working in a Health Centre for Mother and Child (mostly focusing on local Tribal people), teaching Tailoring to tribal women in various Santali villages of the area, and working as a GM nurse in a Rural Government Hospital.

CHINA

Taiwan-Hong Kong community

The Helpers are present in Hong Kong and Taiwan since the 1960s.
All over these years the services and the activities done by the sisters changed according to the needs of the people and the possibilities of the communities.

Since some year, as the number of the Helpers decreased, the sisters living in Taipei and in Hong Kong (New Territories) form one community.
Three sisters live in Taiwan and one sister lives in Hong Kong.

The sisters in Taipei (Sr. Clara, Sr. Teresa and sr. Martha) are involved in pastoral services in the Parish of the Holy Rosary and in Jesuit networks (CLC), in the ministry of the sick, elderly and homeless, and in the field of the spiritual and religious formation – according to the Ignatian tradition – in Taiwan and abroad, in some Asian Countries.

In Hong Kong, sister Agathe faithfully accompanies and animates the “Friends of Hope”, the huge group of Lay Associates linked to the Charisma of Mary of Providence. They compose the biggest Lay Association present in the Archdiocese of Hong Kong (around 2.500 members). Their main activity is the prayer for the souls, and the ministry of closeness to the families who are living a time of mourning because of the loss of their dear ones.

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