SOCIETÀ SVIZZERA PER LE MISSIONI ESTERE DI BETLEMME

SWISS SOCIETY FOR FOREIGN MISSIONS OF BETHLEHEM. - The Bethlehem Mission House in Immensee was founded in 1896 by the Blessed Barral.

Its purpose was to provide opportunities for young Swiss men to become priests and then work in abandoned missions and parishes. Eleven years later, Fr. Bondolfi took charge of the work, which developed well. On 30 May 1921, the Mission House was raised by the Congregation for the Propagation of the Faith to the status of a Society, which in 1924 sent its first three missionaries to Manchuria. It developed rapidly and today has missions in Manchuria and South Africa. The Constitutions were definitively approved on 4 March 1936.