St. Mary the Immaculate History

St. Mary the Immaculate Roman Catholic Church, is located in Palmerston Ontario, and has been established in 1909 and still continues on today. The following is from their 100th Anniversary booklet, which details their history up until year 2009.

St. Mary’s was constructed in 1909. Garden parties were held at the Dopfer family home on Norman Street as the main fundraiser. During construction, Isadore Dopfer, sat overnight on the corner stone of the church so no vandalism would occur. The church at that time, had only 5 families and all able bodied parishioners helped with the construction to keep costs low. The church of today is in the same location and the same size as when it was originally built one hundred years ago.

In the beginning the church was heated by wood stove, which was situated at the front of the church. Later an oil furnace was placed at the back. During the 1960’s the oil furnace was removed to make room for two new pews that came from St. Peter’s, Durham. Heating was then produced by heating lamps, which were in the receptacles where current lights are now.

1972 brought extensive changes to the church made by Fr. Brennan. He built a new alter, which was smaller and fit the space better than the original one. He also built a backdrop for the alter and covered the wooden painted walls in the sanctuary with cream coloured drapes. The church was also painted and carpeted at this time. A new gas furnace was installed around this time. Several years later a new alter was built and donated by a parishioner in memory of his son.

In the past, an old pump organ in the balcony at the back of the church had provided music; however, it had not been used for many years. Fr. Brennan bought a new small electric organ, which was placed at the front of the church. In 1973 Betty Tarc started to play the organ and has been doing so ever since. For a time from 1976 to 1979 Sandy Pinkse played the guitar. In 1994 Judy Rodger and Linda Brubacher started up with the folk choir and have been alternating the Sunday musical liturgy with Betty since then. An anonymous doner donated the present organ, a Clavinova electric keyboard, to the church in 1997, just in time for Christmas.

Over the years there were many different religious instructions or catechism classes offered. For many years the School Sisters of Notre Dame provided summer school in Harriston or Drayton of the children. Sister Barbara Ann Schnarr, a nun living in Kitchener ran an instructional program for a group of volunteer teachers previous to the initiation of a Sunday school program in 1980. Palmerston children went to the Harriston site. In 1981 Sister Barbara Ann, along with another nun, Sister Victoria Reitzel moved to Palmerston and lived in the community for over 2 years. Sister Barbara Ann continued with the Sunday school program, while Sister Victoria worked with the residents of the Midwestern Regional Children’s Centre. even after the nuns moved away the programs continued. Sister Barbara Ann continued to visit and provide support for the congregation and the volunteers. The Loretto nuns ran a correspondence program from Guelph to further educate the youth of the congregation.

Along with structural changes, Mass times also went through many changes throughout the years. In the 1940’s a priest came and offered Mass twice a month. In the early 1960’s priests from St. Jerome’s College in Kitchener helped out. There were two Masses in Drayton and one each in Palmerston and Harriston. Soon there were no priests available to assist and the pastor had to do all three communities on Sunday. For awhile we had Mass at 8:30AM, and then it switched to 4:00PM on Sunday afternoons. When the church began allowing Sunday liturgy on Saturday evenings, it made sense for the congregation to change the Mass time to 7pm. It has been at this time for the past 37 years. For the last 10 years we have switched to 5:00PM for the winter months. For more than 30 years we have also had Wednesday weekday Masses with the 1st Wednesday of the month being held at the nursing home. This is when our Eucharistic ministers help out with the sick and shut-ins.

Up until 1994 the ladies of the church took turns each month to clean the church. It was their responsibility to get the alter ready, do the linen, clean and dust the church. The outside work was volunteered by a dedicated parishioner until his passing. The cleaning and landscaping are now being hired out.

The CWL, held in Drayton, has been active over the years with many of our ladies having held positions on the executive.

Over the last century we have had 2 world wars and parishioners being veterans of these wars; it was these experiences that taught our volunteers who helped build and maintain this church. They have done it for the love of God; love of country and the freedom to practice your own religion, and for the love of this church.

With a current 25 family parishioners; marriages, births, deaths, and sacraments have occurred, families have been raised and moved on. But our faith has gone on as a reminder of our little church in Palmerston.

History of Parish Priests

1894-1903 Fr. Daniel Kehoe

1903-1910 Fr. T. Heydon

1910-1924 Fr John J. Arnold

1924-1934 – Fr. J.P. Cremen

1934-1949 – Fr. Donald J. Curtis

1949-1954 – Fr. J.G. Dehler

1954-1959 – Fr. Joseph Gillen

1959-1960 – Fr. R.A. Jordon

1960-1964 – Fr. Bruce Hartleib

1964-1967 – Fr. Angelico Valeriote

1967-1969 – Fr. Michael Callaghan

1969-1971 – Fr. Gerry Mulhall

1971-1975 – Fr. Donald Brennan

1975-1983 – Fr. Andrew Meszaros

1983-1991 – Fr. Robert Stainsby

1991-1999 – Fr. Brian Tiffin

2001-2003 – Fr. Gary Schlack

2003-2005 – Fr. Mark Sullivan

2005-2008 – Fr. Jiri Macenauer

2008 – 2011 Fr. Robert Love

2011 – 2012 – Fr. Tomon

2012 – 2013 – Fr. Kim

2013 – 2021 – Fr. Piotr Golinski

2021 – Present – Fr. Stephen Gilbert