"[4] To accomplish this, the religious of the IVE profess the evangelical counsels of poverty, chastity, and obedience under vow and live in community.

Carlos Miguel Buela founded the Institute of the Incarnate Word in Argentina on March 25, 1984, on the Solemnity of the Annunciation with the approval of Bishop León Kruk in the Diocese of San Rafael.

In addition to professing evangelical counsels of poverty, chastity, and obedience, members take a fourth vow of "Marian slavery".

As a result, none of the bishops of San Rafael considered the group to have met the canonical conditions to become an Institute of Consecrated Life.

[12] In January 2025, the Dicastery for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life, under the leadership of Sister Simona Brambilla, announced that Bishop José Antonio Satué and Sr. Clara Echarte would be pontifical delegates with full governing powers over the male and female branches of the IVE.

[13] After the denunciation of seminarians accusing the founder of the Institute, Carlos Miguel Buela, of sexual abuse, a decree[14] of the Congregation for Institutes of Consecrated Life, signed by Cardinal Gardin in 2010, judged these accusations to be plausible and found Buela guilty of inappropriate behavior with adults.

[16] The Institute of the Incarnate Word continues on its website to refer to its founder,[17] honors him following his death,[18] and remains silent on abuses.

Several articles detail a persistent dispute with the Holy See,[19] and a "shadow government" denounced by Cardinal Santos Abril, the Pontifical Commissioner of the congregation, which forbids any homage to the founder, who was dismissed by the Vatican under Benedict XVI.

Several years later, given its rapid growth, the IVE officially established the Province of the Immaculate Conception which includes the United States, Canada, Mexico, and Guyana.

As the Holy See indicates, a mission sui iuris is a special missionary territory which is not part of any diocese, vicariate, or apostolic jurisdiction.

[25] Thus, to provide an organized structure to such a territory, the Pope appoints a religious superior as the highest-ranking Church authority within its boundaries.

[28] Thus, in addition to managing houses of formation in Argentina, Brazil, Ecuador, Peru, Italy, Taiwan, the United States, and the Philippines, the Institute provides formators and professors for diocesan seminaries and universities in Italy, Peru, the Holy Land, Papua New Guinea, Kazakhstan, Ukraine, and the United States.

Founded on March 19, 1988, by Buela, the Servants of the Lord and the Virgin of Matará (SSVM) is the female branch of the Religious Family of the Incarnate Word.

[30] For example, since 2014, priests and religious of the Institute of the Incarnate Word and the Servants of the Lord and the Virgin of Matara have played important roles in caring for the displaced Christian refugees fleeing the threat of ISIS attacks in Baghdad[31] and in Syria.

As patroness of the missionaries of the Religious Family of the Incarnate Word, Our Lady of Luján continues to journey to foreign lands.