The event will feature live music, children’s activities, a bouncy house, a dunk tank, horseback riding courtesy of Rose Creek Horse Adventure, and authentic Mexican cuisine by Pompeyos Mexican Grill. Dinner will be served from noon to 2 p.m., for $10 per adult, and free for children 12 and younger. A live auction will begin at about 12:30 p.m. A silent auction will be from noon to 4:30 p.m.

Grand raffle tickets are available, with the grand prize an all-inclusive trip for four to Beaver Island, valued at over $5,000. Tickets are $25 each, or $100 for five tickets, available from parish members, at A-1 Woods and Waters, and at VanPamel’s Hometown Diner. The drawing will be held at 4:30 p.m. at the festival. You do not have to be present to win.

All proceeds will be used for the replacement of the church’s roof, which is in desperate need of repair, according to Katherine Stevens, president of the Pastoral Council.

She has been a member at St. Augustine since 2010.

St. Augustine Catholic Church will celebrate its 125th anniversary on Sunday. Pictured above are some of the nuns who served there years ago. In the top row, from left to right, are Sister Mary Faustina, Sister Mary Ignatius, and Sister M. Bertrand. In the middle row are Sister Mary Jeanne and Sister Mary Celeste. In the bottom row are Sister M. Martin Ann, Sister Mary Bertha, and Sister Mary Regina of Jesus.

“We’ve often had a festival on that day,” she said of the annual event, “but it’s never been the big festival that we’re having now.”

Preceding the festival, Mass will be held at 8 a.m. and again at 10 a.m.

“After the 10 a.m. Mass, we are going to have a service for St. Joseph,” Stevens explained. “And that’s because we are going to have an icon of St. Joseph that will be here. And it’s being brought here by the Knights of Columbus bikers. The icon is traveling throughout the Diocese of Gaylord, and we were fortunate enough to be able to have it here for our festival.”

“This beautiful icon is housed at St. Joseph’s Oratory in Montreal, Canada’s preeminent Shrine to St. Joseph, founded by St. Andre Bessette,” a letter by Supreme Knight Patrick E. Kelly explains. “The original is written (prayerfully painted) by Elizabeth Bergeron, from a drawing by famed iconographer Alexandre Soboleve.”

The image portrays St. Joseph holding the Child Jesus, whose hand is raised to bless the world. St. Joseph holds a flowering staff to signify that he was chosen by God. The white lilies on the staff represent his purity and chastity.

“Our world desperately needs men and women of courage,” Kelly continues in the letter. “But in a particular way, it needs courageous fathers ­– men willing to stand up and to carry out their own mission of protecting, defending and raising future generations. It needs men willing to risk it all, in order to offer the world Jesus. In short, our world needs men in the model of St. Joseph.”

Since it started in 1979, the Knights of Columbus Pilgrim Icon Program has conducted over 174,800 local council and parish prayer services, with 22 million participants.

Brief history of

St. Augustine

The first church building was built by volunteers in the 1890s.

“There was little money among the early settlers but there was a great willingness to work and a strong desire to have a church building of their own,” a history of St. Augustine Parish explains.

Prior to a building being erected, Catholics in the Hillman area received visits from priests from Alpena, including Father Winter from St. Anne’s Church, and the Rev. Father T.P. Flannery from St. Bernard’s Church. Early on, Hillman Catholics met at various homes, including that of Mr. and Mrs. John Butler in Long Rapids, and Mr. E.O. Avery’s farm home located three miles northeast of the present village of Hillman, where the Rev. Father Charles DeQuoy from St. Anne’s led services. In the 1890s, Mass began being offered at the farm home of Mr. and Mrs. Napoleon LaFave, located a mile and a half north of the village on a much better road, providing a smoother ride by horse and buggy. The first lay catechist was Mrs. William Cartier.

Once the church was built, the parishioners were so proud of it.

“The white cross on the top of the little church could be seen for miles in all directions,” the history notes. “The cross was noticeable to travelers coming from Alpena to Hillman as it gleamed for over 60 years against the western sky.”

Even cows were drawn to the building, as some women of the church (Mrs. John Gohl Sr., Mrs. John Forrest, and Mrs. Joseph Kurtz) noticed while kneeling by one of the temporary benches. Through the cracks in between the floorboards, they could see the cows “contentedly chewing their cuds” under the church.

On Oct. 1, 1897, Father Godfrey Lenzen was appointed the pastor of St. Rose Church in Herron, as well as the Mission of St. Augustine in Hillman.

The first recorded baptism was Mary Olive LePine, daughter of Alfred LePine and Alvina Arneald on Dec. 12, 1897, conferred by Father Lenzen and sponsored by Joseph LaFraniere and Mary Villeneuve.

The first recorded marriage was that of William Villeneuve, son of Napoleon Villeneuve and Delina Amelotte, marrying Amelia Sheff, daughter of Andrew Sheff and Martina Ranger, witnessed by Father O’Connell on May 25, 1898.

Many decades later, the church received full parochial status and a resident pastor, Father Harry Hart, on Oct. 5, 1951.

A new church was built in its current location in 1958. The former church building burned down in late 1977, which had been used as the Veterans of Foreign Wars Hall.

Father James Siler is the current pastor of St. Augustine Parish.

Stevens said the roof replacement will cost about $127,000.

She hopes people will come out to support the parish and enjoy the festivities.

“Our parishioners … we have elderly people who are on fixed incomes,” Stevens said. “And then we have, luckily and for which we are so grateful, we have a growing population of young people with four, five and six kids, sometimes seven.”

She said the church is full of generous people with servants’ hearts.

For more information, visit restfulhearts.org. The church is located at 24140 Veterans Memorial Highway, Hillman. Call 989-742-4542 with questions.