Who we are
A community of sisters on a Pune hillside.
The Poona Medical Mission Sisters Society (PMMSS) is a community of Catholic sisters based at Bibwewadi, Pune. Our work centres on healing and care for the earth.
We belong to the Medical Mission Sisters, founded by Dr. Anna Dengel and companions. The international community serves worldwide in the spirit of Jesus the Healer.
Our sisters made their home on this rocky hillside and named it Sandipani, “radiating light.” What began as community health workshops across the region grew into the Holistic Health Centre, tending the hill as one of the last green lungs of Pune.
Today four ministries carry that healing forward — together they form the Holistic Health Ministry of PMMSS.
Our vision
Healing and Wholeness— a reality for the human and earth community.
Our mission
Promoting integral ecology through holistic health, spiritual well-being, and care for the Earth.
Our origins
It began with women, for women.
Following the establishment of a pioneer hospital for women in Rawalpindi, the young doctor Anna Dengel served there. She saw how limited access to women doctors put mothers and babies at risk.
For Anna, skilled health care for women was a matter of justice. She gathered companions to establish the Medical Mission Sisters, dedicated to whole-person care and professional medicine.
Church rules originally restricted religious women from practising medicine in full. After steadfast petitioning, full approval was granted for women religious to practise medicine and surgery. Today, this tradition of holistic care and healing is carried forward by Medical Mission Sisters, associates and collaborators.
Ministries on the campus
Started, and evolved.
Sandipani
Education and training. The sisters arrive on a barren, rocky slope and name it “radiating light.”
Holistic Health Centre
Seventeen years of travelling workshops take permanent shape as a centre for training and healing.
Prashanti Health Club
A health club on the campus, opened in 2015.
Samanvaya
Eco Healing and Health, on the conviction that no one is whole on a wounded planet.
Core values
What holds the work together.
Healing Presence
We reveal God’s healing love through compassionate service — believing that presence itself is where healing begins.
Wholeness
Body, mind, spirit, emotions and environment are treated as one interconnected whole, never in isolation.
Human Dignity
Every person who comes to us — whatever their faith, background or ability — is met with respect and unconditional care.
Care of the Earth
We tend the land as we tend our people, believing a wounded planet cannot sustain a healed people.
Empowerment
We walk alongside women, children and families so they can take responsibility for their own health and lives.
Team Spirit
Sisters, co-workers, students and benefactors come together as one community, rooted in collaboration, partnership and mutual respect.
Underlying philosophy
Illness is an invitation to look deeper.
Holistic healing promotes the interrelationship of body, mind and spirit. It views a person’s wellness from every possible perspective — which means treating the person, and not the disease.
We see illness as a signal to attend to the whole person. Our approach calls for therapies to be used appropriately and responsibly, with attention to the person’s life beyond the treatment room.
