DAUGHTERS OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY AND ST JOSEPH. – The founder of the Institute was Giacomo Heeren, parish priest of Oirschot in Holland, who, around 1820, established an association of pious women for the care of poor sick persons and for the education of girls, especially orphans, deaf-mutes, or those in danger. On 7 July of the same year, the bishop of Bois-le-Duc erected the pious association in ecclesiastical form, which, following its development, was later approved by the Holy See on 7 September 1850. In 1947, the Congregation had 34 houses and 600 sisters.
**DAUGHTERS OF CHARITY (Strasbourg).** – A religious congregation founded in Strasbourg in 1734 by Sister Francesca Genoveffa Pichard, who had left the monastery of St Paul in Chartres. The sisters devote themselves to the care of the sick and to the religious instruction of poor children. It was approved by the Holy See in 1870 and today has 425 houses with more than 4,000 religious; it is spread throughout Alsace and western Germany.