MUHLENBERG TOWNSHIP, Pa. – On Sunday, Reading Pride will host its biggest celebration of the year.<\/p>\n
“It’s a significant year because this marks our Reading Pride’s 20th anniversary. So, we tried to make it extra special,” says Sean Flannery, Board President of Reading Pride Celebration.<\/p>\n
It’s taking place at Jim Dietrich Park in Muhlenberg Township, from eleven to five.<\/p>\n
“There’s going to be great music and good food and lots of things for sale, lots of vendors and sponsors,” Flannery says.<\/p>\n
As the group marks this milestone, organizers are reflecting on just how far the event has come.<\/p>\n
“When I was a kid growing up, and I’m a Berks County native, Flannery says. “We did not have this community. There were little pockets, places. So, it was the efforts of a very small group of people that, and it took a lot of years to actually get the first festival.”<\/p>\n
They say it’s the largest Pride celebration in Berks County, but getting here hasn’t been easy.<\/p>\n
“Is always a challenge, and especially because of the economy, some DEI initiatives and some sponsorships have been pulled. So, this year was definitely more difficult,” Flannery says.<\/p>\n
Even so, organizers say the reason they keep coming back is simple.<\/p>\n
“Our engine to keep this festival alive every year, even though it does get difficult, is those people that come to you and say, “I felt supported. I felt safe. I felt a sense of community,” Flannery says.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"MUHLENBERG TOWNSHIP, Pa. – On Sunday, Reading Pride will host its biggest celebration of the year. “It’s a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":246562,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[214,2088,279,128,130,129],"class_list":["post-246561","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-reading","tag-_homepage_top_stories","tag-area","tag-berks","tag-reading-city","tag-reading-city-headlines","tag-reading-city-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/246561","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=246561"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/246561\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/246562"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=246561"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=246561"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=246561"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}