St. Michael Festival has Been Postponed

Dear St. Michael Family,

Like so many other events planned for this summer, the St. Michael Festival will not happen when it was originally scheduled, June 5-6-7. As of now, we still aren’t sure when we are going to be able to celebrate Mass together. Beyond that, we don't know when festivals will be allowed to happen, so we are working to adapt. A few things to bear in mind:

• As time passes, more events are being canceled or delayed indefinitely.
  • Later in the year, those delayed events are going to happen in a very short time.
  • There is risk of being overwhelmed with fundraisers.
• Our community is hurting.
  • Many of the festival sponsors have not been able to operate since the stay-at-home orders were issued.
  • Festival profits help fund our parish, which has also been affected by the economic pressure.
• Our festival runs on volunteers.
  • It is hard to line up volunteers when we can't see each other.

So, we'll try to adapt. We need to keep praying and working for a time when we can gather again. Assuming that happens this summer, here's the idea:

• Our festival will happen, but it will be reduced in scope:
  • It will be a two-day event (a Saturday/Sunday).
  • We will work to have a premium band for entertainment.
  • We will identify key booths to appeal to our entire community.
  • We will continue to have the raffles.
  • We will still need volunteers.
• Target Festival Dates: Early October.
  • Junetoberfest in October? Why not?
  • We will need to make a decision on this date by mid-July.

• Watch
  • the bulletin,
  • the parish website,
  • the festival website,
  • the parish Facebook page
  • and the festival Facebook page
  for more updates.

We'll follow up with more information about the raffles. We always say the raffles make the festival weatherproof, and now we'll see how they do against a pandemic!

We wish we had a better update with a firmer plan, but we'll keep planning. We'll keep working. We're all in this together, and we're working to do the best we can for our parish.

Stay safe. Keep taking care of each other.

Thanks,

Sean Sage, on behalf of the St. Michael Festival Committee

PS: We are all learning this the hard way: "Plans are worthless, but planning is everything." — Dwight Eisenhower