Vineland is nine miles east of Pueblo, nestled between that city and Avondale.  Originally a truck-farming community, the area benefited from increased employment at the Pueblo Army Depot until activity there began to decline in the 1960s. 

In 1928 the Catholic community was large enough to require two seminarians to teach summer Vacation Bible School.  A visit from Fr. Henry Ford of Denver convinced him that the area needed its own church.  After having been a mission of the first three parishes in Pueblo, St. Ignatius, (now the Cathedral of the Sacred Heart), Mt. Carmel, and St. Patrick, Vineland obtained its own church.  The structure was built at the cost of $19,000, $20,000  of which was donated through the Catholic Extension Society by Mrs. Margaret Conway, in memory of her husband.

The church was named St. Therese, in honor of St. Therese of the Little Flower.  It became a separate parish in 1943, with the Sacred Heart Church in Avondale as its mission.