About Immaculate Conception · Orrville, Alabama
Mission of the Immaculate Conception is a small Catholic mission church located in the rural community of Orrville in Dallas County, Alabama. It sits in the heart of Alabama's Black Belt on Alabama Highway 22 West and is one of the rural satellite worship sites tended by the Edmundite Southern Missions from their base at Our Lady, Queen of Peace in nearby Selma. GCatholic lists the church as a mission (rather than a full parish) of the Metropolitan Archdiocese of Mobile, and its Sunday Mass is celebrated at 8:00 AM. Because the congregation is small and widely scattered, the mission is served primarily by retired and resident Edmundite priests who live together at the Edmundite residence in Selma.
- Patron
- Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary
- Diocese
- Metropolitan Archdiocese of Mobile
Why belong here
Immaculate Conception in Orrville offers Catholics in this small Alabama Black Belt community a regular weekly Sunday Mass (8:00 AM) in a faith tradition that has served the rural poor of the region since the Edmundites began their work in 1937. Worship here is a chance to be part of a tightly-knit, mission-style community sustained by the same Society of St. Edmund priests who founded the broader Edmundite Southern Missions from Selma. Visiting Catholics can expect a simple, rural setting and sacramental care provided by Edmundite fathers who also staff Queen of Peace in Selma and other nearby mission churches.
Mass times at Immaculate Conception
Weekly Mass schedule
Overview of Immaculate Conception Mission, Orrville
Immaculate Conception is a Catholic mission church in the small community of Orrville in Dallas County, Alabama. It is classified by GCatholic as a mission (not a parish) within the Metropolitan Archdiocese of Mobile, and it is served by the Society of St. Edmund (Edmundite) priests who staff the Edmundite Southern Missions from their base in nearby Selma. Sunday Mass is celebrated at 8:00 AM, and the church's mailing address is 13663 Alabama Highway 22 West, Orrville, AL 36767.
- Address: 13663 Alabama Highway 22 West, Orrville, AL 36767
- Phone: (334) 874-8931
- Jurisdiction: Metropolitan Archdiocese of Mobile
- Type: Mission (per GCatholic)
- Sunday Mass: 8:00 AM
Edmundite Southern Missions Connection
Immaculate Conception is part of the wider pastoral network of the Edmundite Southern Missions. The Society of St. Edmund was founded in France in 1843, came to the United States in 1898, and has been based in Vermont since 1930. In 1936 Pope Pius XI called on American religious to minister among African Americans in the Deep South, and two young Edmundites — Father Frank Casey and Father Barney Paro — answered by arriving in Selma on July 6, 1937 to found the Missions. They settled into a former saloon on Broad Street, began door-to-door evangelization, and built the small St. Elizabeth's Mission chapel. From that Selma base the Edmundites have, across the decades, opened and sustained mission churches, schools, hospitals, and nutrition programs across the Alabama Black Belt — including Immaculate Conception in Orrville, Saint John the Baptist in Montgomery, and Saint Joseph in Tuskegee Institute.
- Founder: Rev. Frank Casey, SSE (with Rev. Barney Paro, SSE)
- Founding date: July 6, 1937
- Headquarters: Selma, Alabama (Broad Street)
- Counties served: Dallas, Perry, Monroe/Wilcox, Lowndes (plus New Orleans)
- Services include health care, education, nutrition, elder care, and spiritual outreach
Clergy Serving the Mission
Because Immaculate Conception is a small rural mission, it is staffed by Edmundite priests resident at the Edmundite residence in Selma rather than by a pastor living on site. According to a 2015 Saint Michael's College report on the Edmundite Southern Missions, the resident Edmundites who rotate through parish ministry sites include Father Stanley Deresienski, SSE, whose main responsibility is Saint Joseph in Tuskegee Institute, as well as retired Edmundites Rev. Paul Pinard, SSE, and Rev. Joseph Hart, SSE — all of whom also help cover Immaculate Conception in Orrville. The senior Edmundite priest at the time, Rev. Richard Myhalyk, SSE, served as pastor of Our Lady, Queen of Peace in Selma, the hub parish for the mission network.
- Rev. Stanley Deresienski, SSE — resident Edmundite; also serves St. Joseph, Tuskegee Institute
- Rev. Paul Pinard, SSE — retired resident Edmundite
- Rev. Joseph Hart, SSE — retired resident Edmundite
- Pastoral support from Edmundite priests at the Selma Edmundite residence
Edmundite Heritage in the Alabama Black Belt
Immaculate Conception sits in the same Dallas County landscape where the Edmundite Southern Missions did their most nationally visible work. In 1944 the Edmundites purchased a rundown infirmary for African Americans and turned it into Good Samaritan Hospital; in 1950 they opened the Good Samaritan School of Nursing; and in 1947 Father Nelson Ziter launched the Don Bosco Boys' and Girls' Club, which helped about 150 Black youth win college places. After 'Bloody Sunday' on the Edmund Pettus Bridge on March 7, 1965, it was the Edmundite-run Good Samaritan Hospital that treated the voting-rights marchers. In 1971, under Father Nelson Ziter, St. Elizabeth's Mission merged with the white Assumption parish to form Our Lady, Queen of Peace — making Selma's Catholics among the first Southern congregations to integrate. Immaculate Conception in Orrville is a direct pastoral outgrowth of this broader Edmundite presence in rural Alabama.
- Good Samaritan Hospital founded 1944
- Don Bosco Boys' and Girls' Club founded 1947 by Fr. Nelson Ziter, SSE
- Selma to Montgomery march ('Bloody Sunday') victims treated at Good Samaritan Hospital, March 7, 1965
- Queen of Peace integrated parish created in 1971 by merger of St. Elizabeth's and Assumption
Visiting and Location Notes
The mission is set on Alabama Highway 22 West on the west side of Orrville, in Dallas County, Alabama. Its USGS feature name is 'Church of the Immaculate Conception,' recorded at approximately N32.30986° W87.23166° and an elevation of 190 ft, on the Orrville 1:24K topographic map. Because the church is small and rural, visitors are advised to confirm Mass times before traveling, particularly since sacramental coverage is shared among priests based in Selma.
- Setting: rural Dallas County, Alabama
- Highway: Alabama Highway 22 West
- USGS coordinates: N32.30986°, W87.23166° (elevation 190 ft)
- Confirm Mass times before traveling