The Vincentian Motherhouse Renovation Project
This sprawling building with its four floors and very long hallways, is the international home of the Congregation of the Mission, where Vincentian priests and brothers have lived, prayed, studied, served, and more since the early 19th century.
Paris is our spiritual home. It is the city where St. Vincent lived and worked for many years. This house, our Maison Mère is the place where his legacy is preserved, his history displayed, and where he still seems to preside.
While we built this house for ourselves, we long have been welcoming guests to join us. Many groups use our meeting facilities, dining room, and guest rooms. Visitors find it to be exactly what they need, a place to gather to talk, to rest, and to make decisions about the future and how they are being called to serve.
Similarly, others come to make a retreat or to have study days. There is something delightful about seeing people spill out of our meeting rooms and dining room into our garden where they all admit the busy life of the city seems far, far away. There is a quiet here we all enjoy.
We are in the midst of an extensive renovation of our Maison Mère. This house is a treasure, and we want to make sure that 400 years from now, when the Congregation is celebrating 800 years of service to God’s beloved poor, it is still here and still a place where people grow in holiness.
Our renovation is a slow and careful process. We are preserving and protecting the reasons why people come here while also making the place accessible to everyone, comfortable for our overnight guests and those who come for meetings and more. In the end, this house will be better, not different.
Will you help us make this possible? Will you help us ensure this treasure that carries so much of our history has a long future? We welcome your gift and your presence.
If you’d like to make a donation in a currency that isn’t listed, please email billebb@vims1617.org.
Vincentian priests and brothers around the world staff parishes, seminaries, schools, health clinics, job training centers, and other kinds of service centers so that all God’s children, all our brothers and sisters can live in greater dignity. Like St. Vincent himself, we invite the people we serve to join us in our service so that everyone grows, learns, heals, and rejoices. Our ministry focuses on the presence of God in each person and builds from there.
Choose from one of our specific, life-changing projects below to see your donation in direct action.
Dear to the heart of St. Vincent is the high-quality education, formation, and training of future priests. We have many seminarians and need your help providing them the basics: food, clothing, prayer books, school books.
This project is a major renovation of the Maison Mère in Paris, the international and spiritual home of the Congregation of the Mission since the early 19th century. The goal is to preserve this historical treasure and legacy of St. Vincent de Paul, while also making it accessible and comfortable for the priests, brothers, and the many groups who visit, study, and hold retreats there. Donations ensure the house has a long future of service for another 400 years.
We have 10 seminaries in Africa and South America that are filled to overflowing with a long line of men waiting for admission. We need your help to renovate and enlarge the seminaries so that we can prepare more men for service as Vincentian priests and brothers.
You can support the mission in a way that best fits you. Give general fuel for our work through one of the options below, or explore our specific causes to target your gift to a particular project.
Your immediate gift provides critical resources where the need is greatest, right now. A general donation is the most powerful way to support the full breadth of our work—from feeding the hungry and educating children to providing clean water and supporting our missionaries. Your flexible funding ensures we can respond instantly to emergencies and sustain our long-term, life-changing projects around the world.
Vincent’s Visionaries is a program for recurring donations to support the full range of the Vincentian mission. These gifts fund crucial initiatives in areas with few resources, including food programs, job training centers, education access (including building schools), clean water projects (digging wells), medical care, and seminary support for future priests.
By including VIMS in your will or estate plan, you create a lasting legacy that will sustain the Vincentian mission for generations to come. A planned gift is a profound act of faith and love that continues to fuel essential services—feeding, housing, and educating those on the margins—long after your lifetime. It allows you to make a significant impact without affecting your current financial well-being.