The Diocese of Fall River spans Barnstable, Bristol, Dukes, and Nantucket Counties.

[4] After the Revolution ended in 1783, Pope Pius VI erected in 1784 the Prefecture Apostolic of the United States, encompassing the entire territory of the new nation.

[5] Pope Pius VII erected the Diocese of Boston on April 8, 1808, including all of New England in its jurisdiction.

The pope removed the counties of Bristol, Barnstable, Dukes and Nantucket in Massachusetts from the Archdiocese of Boston.

[7] On May 8, 1904, St. Mary's Cathedral was packed with worshipers for Stang's first mass, with police detachments controlling the crowd, estimated at 25,000 people, on the street outside the building.

[8][9] During his tenue, Stang established eleven parishes and founded Saint Anne's Hospital in Fall River.

[10] After Stang's death in 1907, Pius X appointed Daniel Feehan from the Diocese of Springfield as the second bishop of Fall River that same year.

[11] In 1945, Pope Pius XII appointed James Connolly from the Diocese of Providence to serve as coadjutor bishop to assist Cassidy.

In early 1951, Cassidy published a pastoral letter forbidding girls cheerleading at Catholic high schools in the diocese, citing what he termed the indecency of their outfits.

As bishop, one of Connolly's special concerns was with providing secondary education in the four urban areas of the diocese.

[15] Late in 1991, Pope John Paul II appointed Cronin as archbishop of the Archdiocese of Hartford.

He established an office for AIDS Ministry and two new residences for women, fostered vocations to the priesthood and reorganized the diocesan curia or administration.

O’Malley created the Office of Pastoral Planning to assist him on merging parishes and assigning priests.

[7] In 2002, John Paul II named O'Malley as bishop of the Diocese of Palm Beach and appointed George Coleman as his successor.

In the early 1990s, revelations surfaced about how the Diocese of Fall River protected Reverend James Porter from charges of sexual abuse between 1960 and 1964.

[19] A lawsuit was filed in 2014 against Archbishop Cronin of Hartford by two men who claimed they were sexually abused as young boys by Reverend Maurice Souza, a priest in East Falmouth.

The plaintiffs claimed that Cronin, then bishop of Fall River, failed to properly supervise Souza, who allegedly molested the boys during the 1980's in East Falmouth and on athletic trips out of town.

The diocese suspended DeGagne from his priestly duties in 2019[27] Stonehill College – Easton The current Superintendent of Schools is Daniel S.