The parish of St Lukes belongs to the congregation of the Missionaries of St. Charles – Scalabrinians – is an international community of religious serving migrants and refugees of different cultures, religions and ethnicities in 32 countries and on five continents. 

 

The Congregation was founded on November 28, 1887, by Blessed John Baptist Scalabrini (1839-1905), bishop of Piacenza (Italy). It was the period of massive emigration from Italy and Europe toward the Americas.

 

It was a far-reaching phenomenon whose importance Bishop Scalabrini was able to grasp in both its social and religious dimensions.

 

Th Scalbrinian missionary focus for the last twenty-five years has been to be migrants with the migrants and to be in mission with people on the move along with a special priority for the poorest migrants. What has become very obvious is that as we have taken more missionary risks and made an effort to clarify our Charism we have been blessed with more and more vocations. The blessing is doubled by the fact that we are currently receiving the vocations that match our present needs.

 

John Baptist Scalabrini lived the drama of the exodus of migrants who, during the last decades of the nineteenth century, travelled in great numbers from Europe to the countries in the New World. He clearly saw the need for the specific pastoral care of migrants through a suitable network of spiritual assistance. In this perspective, and giving proof of keen spiritual insight and a concrete practical sense, he founded the Congregation of the Missionary Priests and the Missionary Sisters of Saint Charles. He strongly supported the need for legislative and institutional instruments for the human and juridical protection of migrants against all forms of exploitation.

 

Today, in different situations, the spiritual sons and daughters of Msgr. Scalabrini, who were later joined by the "Secular Institute of the Scalabrinian Missionary Women", continue to give witness to Christ's love for migrants and to offer them the Gospel. In 1998, John Paul II declared him Blessed and defined him as the "Father of Migrants".