OUR NOBLE ORIGIN

Little Flower Congregation

(CST Fathers)

Little Flower Congregation (CST Fathers) is a congregation of religious priests that originated on 19 March 1931 in the Archdiocese of Ernakulam, Kerala. It was started as a society of Brothers under the name Little Flower Brotherhood by Fr. Thomas Panat, later known as Fr. Basilius. It was reorganized into a religious institute (thereafter called the Little Flower Congregation) with an approved constitution, which was later revised according to the new Oriental Code of Canon Law. The canonical approval was given by the then Archbishop of Ernakulam, Mar Augustine Kandathil, for its establishment and reorganization.

The Congregation was bifurcated to form a congregation of priests (CST Fathers) and a congregation of Brothers (CST Brothers). Considering the further growth and development of our Congregation, and taking into account the increase in the number of members and Ashrams and the wide expansion of the area of our apostolic activities, two Regions were erected – St. Joseph’s and St. Thomas – in our Congregation on 15 February 1992. They were reorganized as Provinces on 19 March 1994. Marking another milestone in the history of the Congregation, on 10 June 1994, the Punjab-Rajasthan Region, with the name Khrist Jyoti Region, under St. Joseph’s Province, and the Gorakhpur-Nepal Region, with the name Little Flower Region, under St. Thomas Province, were erected.

His Holiness Pope John Paul II raised our Congregation to the status of a Religious Institute of Pontifical Right on 21 December 1995. St. Thérèse, who was proclaimed a Doctor of the Church in Rome on 19 October 1997 by His Holiness Pope John Paul II, is the Patroness of the Congregation. We started our mission work on the African continent in the Diocese of Musoma, Tanzania, on 5 August 1999. The Khrist Jyoti Region and Little Flower Region were raised to the status of Vice-Provinces on 2 January 2000, and they were raised to the status of Provinces on 5 March 2003.