Leadership at St James the Less Catholic Church since 1941 up to the present (2024)

In 1893, a small chapel was built on Perris Boulevard, four miles north of Perris, to serve the residents of the Perris Indian School. This school was forerunner of the Riverside Sherman Institute. Fr. P.J. Stockman, the pastor of St. Bernardine Church in San Bernardino, would travel to Perris for religious services and classes. The chapel and school were closed in 1902.
Over the next years, the small catholic community in Perris was called Mission San Ambrose and was ran by Fr. P.A. Quinn from Our Lady of the Lake Church in Lake Elsinore and San Jacinto and the priests after him until the first resident priest arrived in 1941.