St. Agnes Church in North Huntingdon has its annual fish fries down to a science — at least that’s how volunteer Diane Pesarsick describes it.
For four weeks leading up to Easter, more than 120 churchgoers get into a rhythm.
Boxes of food — fish, french fries and ingredients for coleslaw and halushki — are unloaded from packed delivery trucks on Saturdays. Volunteers come in on Sundays, Mondays and Tuesdays to rotate the fish and help it thaw. More than 20 roasters are used to cook the halushki on Wednesdays, and tartar sauce is prepared on Thursdays.
By the time Friday comes around, it’s go time.
Volunteers prepare coleslaw in the morning before cooking fish nonstop from 2 to 6 p.m. — unless the food supply is exhausted. Others direct the traffic coming into the church from Clay Pike and Guffey Road, guiding community members to areas where their orders are taken.
Four rows of cars merge into one, where church youth run out to deliver the meals.
The process starts all over again the next day.
“It’s a very well-oiled machine,” said Pesarsick, 55, of North Huntingdon. “The people who have been doing these jobs have been doing them (for years). They come in like clockwork.”
Fish fry volunteer Mark Lieberum is excited to get back to work after pausing the annual fundraiser last year to renovate the church’s social hall — a symbol of growth amid the all-too-common decline of churches across Western Pennsylvania.
“This church is a family,” said Lieberum, of North Huntingdon. “We just get along. We have a good time at everything we do.”
Church invests $1 million into renovations
More than $1 million was directed to renovate the church’s Resurrection Hall from January to August 2025, said the Rev. Daniel Ulishney, who has served as pastor of St. Agnes since 2023.
The social hall was built in 1965 as an addition to St. Agnes School, which was located in the now-vacant lot across from the church. Foundational issues were identified at the school in 1999, and it was torn down a year later.
The hall, which remained structurally sound, was retained, and two former classrooms were transformed into a kitchen and storage facility. After years of dreaming of a renovation, the vision came to life last year with upgrades to the restrooms, HVAC, plumbing and front entrance, along with a new roof and windows.
The hall is now used daily by mentorship groups, Scout troops and senior citizen organizations.
‘Something in the culture’
St. Agnes’ investment comes at a time where church closures are increasingly common.
The Diocese of Pittsburgh, for example, announced Feb. 7 it will close seven of eight churches in its St. Joseph the Worker Parish next month.
Since its inception in 1951, the Diocese of Greensburg has dropped from 114 parishes to 78. International priests, who account for about a third of the diocese’s priests, play a pivotal role in keeping churches alive, according to Bishop Larry Kulick.
St. Agnes Church is supported by an influx of people moving to the North Huntingdon area, Ulishney said. The township’s population has grown from about 30,600 people in 2010 to 31,880 in 2020, according to the latest available U.S. Census data.
In the past two years, the church has registered more than 150 new households, Ulishney said. The church has about 1,500 households registered as members, he said, but about 700 people typically attend one of three Masses on a given weekend.
That growth is evidenced by the strong turnout the church receives from its fish fries each year. In 2024, the church raised more than $40,000 for its operations by selling 6,400 pieces of fish, 2,430 servings of halushki, 8,000 pierogies, 960 pounds of french fries and 6,400 servings of coleslaw.
“I think there’s something in the culture,” Ulishney said. “We’re at a moment when people are searching to connect to God in a more profound way.”