The History of the Centre

The Fraternity opens its first mission in Brazil, choosing to settle in the São Cristóvão neighbourhood, on the outskirts of Salvador de Bahia.

This is not simply the opening of a new religious house, but the beginning of a stable missionary presence alongside the most vulnerable people.

The first brothers and sisters live in temporary facilities, sharing the daily life of the local population and building relationships founded on listening, trust and fraternity.

From listening to the needs of the local area, the Centro Nossa Senhora Aparecida is born, dedicated to the Patroness of Brazil.

The Centre is created to offer children from the most vulnerable families a safe, educational environment full of opportunities.

From its earliest years it welcomes more than a hundred children from the surrounding communities, offering educational, formative and recreational activities that also involve their families.

The goal is not only to provide assistance, but to accompany every child in their own human, cultural and spiritual growth, promoting values of solidarity, respect and responsibility.

In the following years, the Centro Nossa Senhora Aparecida becomes a point of reference for the whole neighbourhood. Alongside activities dedicated to children, initiatives for human development, family support, spiritual formation and community services are developed. At the same time, the project to build a convent that could become the heart of the Fraternity's life and social works is born.

After more than ten years of missionary presence, the new Convent of the Franciscan Fraternity of Betania is inaugurated.

Built with simple, essential architecture, perfectly integrated into the climate and landscape of Bahia, the convent today represents the spiritual and operational heart of the mission.

After years of educational presence through the nursery school, the Centro Nossa Senhora Aparecida takes a new and decisive step in its journey.

With the laying of the first stone, construction officially begins on the Nossa Senhora Aparecida School, intended to accompany children and young people from age 6 to 18, offering them a complete educational path. The new school will be built alongside the existing Centre and will be able to welcome around 400 students, guaranteeing a free, quality education combined with human, social and Christian formation. The work is made possible thanks to the support of Italian Cooperation, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation, the Italo-Latin American International Organisation (IILA) and numerous benefactors who believed in the project. With this new undertaking, one of Father Pancrazio Gaudioso's greatest dreams takes shape: to offer children from the outskirts of Salvador not only a place to be welcomed in their first years of life, but a complete educational path able to accompany them into adulthood.