Bishop Richard Phelan, fourth bishop of Pittsburgh, dedicated the new Saint Mary Church in 1886. Shortly after, the bishop sought to establish a parish for the English-speaking Catholics in McKees Rocks. In October 1888, Mass was offered in the Enterprise Hotel, and the cornerstone was laid for the church that would be the center of the new parish, dedicated to the patronage of Saint Francis de Sales in 1889. Formed from territory that was part of two older parishes, Saint Philip, Crafton, and Saint James, West End, the new parish was not a national parish like Saint Mary, but a territorial one.
The first church was a two-story building that served the parish as a school as well as for divine worship. There were ten classrooms on the first floor, and the church on the second floor could seat 400 persons. Father Charles Coyne was appointed the first pastor. A small frame house several blocks from the church was converted into a rectory for him. Not long after his arrival, four Sisters of Charity from Seton Hill, Greensburg, arrived to staff the school. Father Coyne moved from his residence to a rented room in order to provide housing for the Sisters. A new convent was constructed in 1893. A new rectory was built in 1894.
At Saint Mary, Father Zwickert was transferred to a parish in Altoona in 1891, and the bishop appointed Father Adam Tonner as the next pastor. Father Tonner saw that the parish would continue to grow and made provisions for the purchase of land for a cemetery. It was blessed in November 1893. Earlier in that same year, the Sisters of Divine Providence consented to take charge of the parochial school.