A congregation of secular priests founded at Lyons, France in 1856, by Monsignor de Bresillac and Father Planque. The latter reconstituted it in 1859. Its constitutions were provisionally approved in 1890, and definitively in 1900; they were revised and again approved by the Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples in 1923,1928. It has charge of the Vicariate Apostolic of Benin and the Prefectures Apostolic of the Ivory Coast, Gold Coast, Nigeria, Dahomey, and the Delta of the Nile Two Apostolic schools are at Clermont-Ferrand and Cork, Ireland, and two preparatory schools at Nantes, France, and Keer-Maestricht, Holland. The mother-house is at Lyons.