Cana Family Institute is an independent, lay-driven organization organized and established in the Archdiocese of Saint Paul and Minneapolis in 2012 as a non-profit 501c3. The founding board, with the encouragement of the chancellor for the Archdiocese of Saint Paul and Minneapolis, began to establish statutes outlining Cana Family Institute as a private association of the lay faithful in 2013. In addition to outreach in 3 other dioceses, in 2014 Cana programming began in parishes and Catholic schools.

Cana Family Institute’s core programming, formerly called Familia, has over 26 years of history and over 20,000 alumni around the country. The heart of The Cana Experience is bringing to life Saint John Paul II’s brilliant papal writings on marriage and family – as well as other church documents including Saint Paul VI’s Humanae Vitae – by seamlessly weaving them with the Catechism and Gospel, and then encouraging practical ways to integrate that knowledge into practice.