The first Episcopal service was held in St. Peter in 1854. The service occurred in the home of Captain William B. Dodd, one of the founders of St. Peter, and his wife, Harriet Newell Jones Dodd. Bishop C. Jackson Kemper, first missionary bishop of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States, conducted the service.

Between 1854 and 1856, the Episcopal services, in St. Peter, were held in private homes and in at the public school by Reverend Timothy Wilcoxson and Reverend Ebenezer Steele Peake. Both Wilcoxson and Peake were traveling missionary priests serving the Minnesota Valley. In 1856, St. Peter was assigned its first resident missionary priest, Reverend Ezra Jones. Jones oversaw the construction of the first church building between 1856 and 1857. A portion of the building's construction fee was contributed by the Church of Holy Communion, New York City. The connection between New York and St. Peter arouse from Harriet Dodd. Previously, she was a member of the New York Church prior to marrying and the church in St. Peter was named in honor of the New York church.

The Church of the Holy Communion, St. Peter, Nicollet County, Minnesota, was organized as a mission in 1857 and admitted to the Minnesota Convention of the Protestant Episcopal Church in 1858. The rector, wardens, vestrymen, and congregation organized as a parish in 1867. The parish was incorporated in 1870 under Reverend Edward Livermore who served St. Peter's residents between 1860 and 1883.