The Society of St.Vincent de Paul (SSVP) is an international organisation. In promoting human dignity and integrity, the SSVP works to redress situations which adversely affect peoples’ lives and their basic rights. The SSVP was founded in 1833 by Frederic Ozanam who was then a student of Sorbonne University in Paris.

SSVP is established across the five continents in 133 countries, with a membership of 900,000. The SSVP aims to help men, women and families to break their cycle of poverty and disadvantage. It is not a benevolent society but works on a person to person basis.

The SSVP in Malaysia began in 1934 with the first Conference (as our branches are called) formed in the Church of the Assumption, Penang. To-date we have 62 conferences with a membership of 900.

The primary works of the Conferences in Malaysia is to give out monthly subsidies in the form of food rations, school expenses, bus fares and pay for schooling needs at the beginning of the school term like uniforms, shoes, exercise books and other yearly fee . Another important role is home visits to the needy to access their needs and also counsel them.

Sometimes in the mid 80’s the SSVP embarked on a mission of ‘teaching them to fish instead of providing them the fish’. The aim was to bring them out of the poverty cycle. It was then decided to set up Homes and bring children from poverty areas and broken families and provide them a conducive learning and living environment. This gave birth to the creation of the first Home ‘RUMAH OZANAM’(named after our founder Frederic Ozanam). Today SSVP in Selangor have 12 other homes/centers catering to various needs of the less fortunate among us.

Society of St.Vincent de Paul and Rumah Ozanam