In the early nineteenth century Catholics in the area of Utica were served by missionaries and priests riding circuit out of New York.

There is no record of where the first Mass was celebrated in Utica, but there is no doubt that it was in the home of John C. Devereux, one of the pioneer Catholics then (1813) a member of the board of trustees of St. Mary's.

Michael O'Gorman, pastor of St. Mary's in Albany, celebrated the first public Mass in Utica, in the Court House, 10 January 1819.

The friars asked the Sisters of St. Francis of Philadelphia to come teach in the parish schools of St. Joseph's and Assumption in Syracuse.

The present church was built in 1871 and is 180 feet long with a simple basilican plan in the German Romanesque style.

[3] After her beatification, a statue was erected in honor of Mother Marianne Cope, who attended the church in her childhood.

The soup kitchen hot meals and/or bag lunches every day to struggling families and individuals, the unemployed, and the homeless.