Pope Leo XIII erected the Diocese of Grand Rapids out of the Archdiocese of Detroit in 1882, including Kalamazoo.

That same year, John Paul II named Reverend James Murray of Lansing to replace Markiewicz.

In 2018, Bishop Bradley proposed a ten-step plan for overhauling church policies on the reporting of sexual abuse allegations.

[9] In January 2019, Bradley assigned Archbishop Emeritus John Nienstedt, of the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis, to assist for several months at a parish in Battle Creek.

[10] In May 2019, Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel announced that Reverend Jacob Vellian had been indicted on two charges of rape.

[11] In February 2020, the diocese announced that an individual was claiming that Reverend Richard Fritz, who faced embezzlement charges in 2017, had sexually abused them during the late 1970s and early 1980s.

The coat of arms also contains an open book displaying the Latin phrase Tolle Lege (Take and Read).

The book represents the bible and the quote comes from a story by Augustine of Hippo, patron saint of the diocesan cathedral.

According to Augustine, he was meditating on the bible under a tree when he was a young man, He heard a small child tell him "Tolle lege.".

Opening the bible to the Epistle to the Romans 13:13, Augustine read the following passage: "Let us live honorably as in the day, not in reveling and drunkenness, not in debauchery and licentiousness, not in quarreling and jealousy.