Locations & History

• St. Mary Campus
• 

• About St. Mary Campus

  In 1851, Fr. Smulders, a Redemptionist priest from Monroe, founded the first Catholic Church in Adrian, located on the corner of Erie and Center Streets. Two years later, Fr. Peter Kindekins was appointed the first pastor of St. Mary’s Church, which is the date used for the establishment of the parish. St. Mary’s was originally known as Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Parish. It was home to all of the Catholics in Adrian until 1863 when the church and school burned down. Parishioners then purchased land on Erie and Division streets where they rebuilt the church, and where the church still stands today. When the new church was dedicated in 1871, the name was changed to Our Lady of Good Counsel. St. Mary’s came to be known as the Irish Parish.

• St. Joseph Campus
• 

• About St. Joseph Campus

  By 1862, there were at least fifty immigrant German-Catholic families who wanted a church of their own, where they could listen to sermons and go to confession in their native language. German parishioners petitioned Bishop LeFevre, of the Diocese of Detroit, to form their own parish. Thus, in April 1863 ground was broken for St. Joseph Catholic Church. The church, which faced Ormsby Street, was a wooden structure set on a brick foundation. On June 3, 1877, they began to construct their second church building, which was dedicated on October 13, 1879 and is the church building still in use today.