Indianapolis cathedral hosts 60th annual Strawberry Festival

[Episcopal News Service — Indianapolis, Indiana] For members of Christ Church Cathedral, here on the northeast corner of Monument Circle, the only thing sweeter than supporting Central Indiana-based nonprofits is doing so with homemade dessert.

The Cathedral Women are putting that longstanding belief in action on June 11 by hosting the 60th annual Strawberry Festival on the cathedral’s front lawn. The festival, the downtown cathedral’s biggest fundraiser, is a beloved and tasty tradition that raises tens of thousands of dollars annually by selling strawberry shortcakes to thousands of hungry visitors.

“It’s such a fun day because you see Monument Circle come alive. Anybody and everybody of all ages is there and hanging out,” Sarah McFetridge, a Cathedral Women member and the festival’s coordinator, told Episcopal News Service. “We have a lot of stories where kids went with their grandparents, then they took their kids and now they’re taking their grandkids every year. It’s really fun to be a part of those core memories for people.”

That’s the case with Rebecca Robinson, who has been coming to the festival with her family annually for 50 years.

“This work is fellowship. It’s love; it’s community. Everything that Indianapolis stands for is right there in that church,” Robinson, a parishioner at St. Timothy’s Episcopal Church in Indianapolis, told ENS.

Many festivalgoers enjoy their fresh treats on the steps of the Indiana State Soldiers and Sailors Monument, which is across the street from the cathedral in the middle of Monument Circle. SPARK on the Circle, a free season pop-up park on the northwest quadrant, is also popular.

The Strawberry Festival began in 1965, when the Cathedral Women baked and sold 100 shortcakes. The cathedral, however, has actually been raising funds by selling strawberries since 1864, according to “The Little Church on the Circle,” a history book published in 1957 and written by pharmaceutical industrialist and philanthropist Eli Lilly Jr. His grandfather was the founder of the pharmaceutical company Eli Lilly and Company.

The cathedral is marking 2026 as the 60th anniversary instead of the 61st because the festival wasn’t held in 2020 because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Although the Strawberry Festival is an official cathedral event, staff and volunteers don’t use it to proselytize. They do, however, distribute small items, like cathedral-branded Pride stickers, that show the congregation’s beliefs.

“I call the Strawberry Festival a sacrament with a little ‘S.’ It’s an outward and visible sign of the grace that this church has for our city and community,” the Very Rev. Gray Lesesne, Christ Church Cathedral’s dean, told ENS. “I think it’s the best snapshot of our life together in a day.”

The cathedral donates all proceeds from the festival, which will be evenly distributed to designated Strawberry Festival grant recipients in the spring and fall – up to $3,000 per recipient.

“The more strawberry shortcakes we sell, the more money we can give to these amazing local charities,” McFetridge said.

Recent recipients include Deeply Ingrained, an Indianapolis-based nonprofit that teaches youth and underserved individuals woodworking skills, and Project Period Indy, an organization that stocks schools, libraries, shelters and other places with free feminine hygiene products.

One of the only conditions the charitable organization members must meet to receive a grant is volunteering the week or day of the Strawberry Festival. Many of them don’t seem to mind, McFetridge said, because they will often return to volunteer in other years, even if their nonprofit isn’t a recipient.

“We blast music in the kitchen, share meals and work together in a kind of assembly line process. It’s very fun community building, and everyone feels accomplished when we see how many shortcakes we’ve made from scratch,” she said.

The shortcake recipe is a “church secret” that, according to McFetridge, “can’t be replicated at home.”

When Indianapolis Bishop Jennifer Baskerville-Burrows was acquainting herself with the diocese after her April 2017 consecration, her first experience of the Strawberry Festival was a “great way to kick off my understanding of what’s really important and core for ministries here.”

“The cathedral is impacting so many lives through all the organizations it supports through the Strawberry Festival,” Baskerville-Burrows told ENS in an in-person interview. “[The festival] is really about the reach that this cathedral has. It’s a great way to get to know the values here in the diocese.”

When she’s able, Baskerville-Burrows likes to greet festivalgoers on the cathedral’s lawn. She’s previously volunteered to prepare the strawberry shortcakes; her task on the assembly line was to scoop the ice cream. She described the quick, repetitive motion as “high pressure.”

“It’s usually hot outside, people are hungry and the lines are long. I applaud the volunteers who come back year after year after year, because this is a way for them to give back to the community,” Baskerville-Burrows said. “Having done it myself, I know what a commitment and what a gift this is. We couldn’t do it without the volunteers.”

Earlier this week, about 200 volunteers, including parishioners from other Episcopal churches in the diocese, made 15,000 shortcake biscuits. And by the end of the day-long festival, they will have gone through 12,000 pounds of strawberries. The ingredients, which are sold à la carte or together for $10 as “The Works,” include shortcake, sliced strawberries, vanilla ice cream and whipped topping.

Nothing will go to waste. If the cathedral doesn’t sell everything, Second Helpings, a hunger relief agency serving Central Indiana, will collect the leftovers and distribute them to nearby shelters.

As a longtime runner who maintains a healthy lifestyle, Baskerville-Burrows rarely eats sweets. Every June, though, she makes an exception for the Strawberry Festival and orders “The Works.”

“It’s once a year, so I’m going to indulge delightfully,” she said.

-Shireen Korkzan is a reporter and assistant editor for Episcopal News Service. She can be reached at skorkzan@episcopalchurch.org.