Founded by Venerable Aloysius Schwartz, World Villages for Children is a nonprofit providing financial support to the charitable programs of the Sisters of Mary. To date, World Villages for Children has helped more than 150,000 children and their families break free from a life of poverty.

Each year the Sisters educate and care for more than 20,000 children living in extreme poverty at no cost to the children’s families. The Villages provide children with a fully accredited in-house education program and vocational training. The Sisters travel to some of the poorest regions, despite the limited infrastructure and potential risks, to ensure they reach the children who most need help. They prioritize admitting the poorest of the poor – children whose families cannot afford enough food, who have had to leave school to help earn money, or who have been orphaned or abandoned.

Aloysius Schwartz was born in Washington, D.C. on September 18, 1930. He grew up with the idea of becoming a priest and working as a missionary serving the poor.  In 1944, he entered St. Charles Seminary in Maryland, then finished his B.A. degree at Maryknoll College, and went on to study theology at The Catholic University of Louvain in Belgium.

As he spent his little free time helping at ragpickers’ camps in Europe, he was further inspired to dedicate his priesthood to the service of the poor. After visiting Banneux, where the Virgin of the Poor appeared with the message “I come to relieve suffering.”, he was more inspired to dedicate his priesthood to the service of the poor in fulfillment of her message. For more information, please visit https://www.worldvillages.org/.