PRETI DELLE STIMMATE DI N. S. GESÙ CRISTO. — It began in Verona on 4 November 1816 as a private union of secular priests for the free exercise of a school of charity that was established as a gymnasium, and for every kind of ecclesiastical ministry at the will of the bishop; but for its founder, the Venerable G. Bertone, and his first companions it was a religious congregation aimed at a free apostolate of missionary priests.
It received the decree of praise on 16 April 1855, the approval of the Institute and its Constitutions on 15 September 1890 and 23 June 1925. Its special purpose is ecclesiastical ministry and the Christian and civic education of youth. Thanks to a recent revival it can now count about 500 actual members, while about as many are being trained in the apostolic schools of its three provinces: Italian, North American, and Brazilian. In 1926 it took on the Chinese mission of Yihsien, now an apostolic prefecture. Besides the ministry of preaching, it has parishes, schools of various kinds including state-recognized ones, colleges, boarding schools, and other works in favor of youth, all distributed across about 50 houses. The Italian province has an early foundation in France; the North American province has a minor seminary and a high school in the apostolic vicariate of the island of Guam in the Pacific, while the Brazilian province also has some missionary activity of its own.