In 1976 Sister Maria Stieren, born at Fürstenfeldbruck (Upper Bavaria), founded a community of sisters in Puma/Tanzania that later on became the first mission of the “Mothers and Missionaries of the Holy Cross”. The station in Puma was followed by further mission s in Gehandu an Dareda, by a nursing home with 29 beds in Munich and by a children’s home for 49 streetkids in Brazil.