Immaculate Conception, Missionary Sisters of the
IMMACULATE CONCEPTION, MISSIONARY SISTERS OF THE
(SMIC, Official Catholic Directory #2760), a pontifical institute founded in Santarém, Brazil, in 1910 by Bp. Amandus Bahlmann, OFM (d. 1939). The congregation follows the rule of the Third Order Regular of St. Francis. Elizabeth Tombrock, a German schoolteacher who became Mother Maria Immaculata of Jesus, and four Conceptionist nuns exclaustrated by papal indult from Ajuda Convent in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, made up the first community. Mother Immaculata, the first superior general, died on April 23, 1938, in Allegany, N.Y., where the congregation had made its first U.S. foundation in 1922. The sisters staff schools, hospitals and other healthcare facilities, and centers for catechetical instruction and for social work. The generalate is in Paterson, NJ.
[j. b. carol]