Three Points of Interest

Wow. The last few posts I wrote were pretty heavy, and the last few days has my head swimming with things I want to write about, all of which are very important issues, but I'm not sure where to even begin. So I'm going to lighten the mood a little with this post...

Wyoming is big. I mean REALLY big. You wouldn't believe just how big...oh wait. I can't plagiarize Douglas Adams. I can, however, give you a list of places I intend on going within the next year.

Roughly thirty five miles east of Cheyenne is the town of Pine Bluffs. In Pine Bluffs is a nice shrine to Our Lady of Peace. I think I initially saw the flyer for this shrine at St. Mary's Cathedral in Cheyenne. The couple who was behind it apparently made a pilgrimage to European apparition sites and decided to erect this shrine. I think this was an excellent idea. I remember the Marian Wayside Shrine on US-41 in St. John, Indiana from when I was a kid. We need more of those around. You just don't see those kind of things anymore and it's too bad. We've become such a politically correct society that ANY outward display of religion is frowned upon (unless it's the state religion of atheism, then it seems to be perfectly permissible). Seeing this is so close, we may just go see this on the next nice day (which we apparently DO get from time to time in Wyoming).

The Carmelite Monks of Wyoming are in Clark, Wyoming, just up the road from Cody. Being close to Yellowstone National Park, you can imagine that this is some of the most beautiful parts of the world, let alone our country. These monks lead a simple life of prayer and work. They use the 1962 Missal and are the only ones in the Diocese of Cheyenne to do so (which is great in the way that we do have Tridentine Masses here in Wyoming but is somewhat inconvenient being literally across the state from them). Plus, they roast and sell their own coffee. This sounds like the kind of monastery I want to support (or likely live next door to). I can't wait to make this road trip!

About 170 miles southeast of Jackson, Wyoming is the town of Lander. Lander is the home of Wyoming Catholic College. This is a liberal arts college where the student learns the traditional classical liberal arts curriculum. These kind of colleges and universities are few and far between these days. Many of them bought into the spirit of the day during the 1960s "Enlightenment" (Read Here: Modernist Heresy) and thus abandoned the traditional structures of an education in liberal arts. Wyoming Catholic tries to revive that classical education and once again makes great what was once commonplace among Catholic institutions of higher education. Plus you can take equine courses, although that IS common among colleges in Wyoming.

So this is the inteniary for the next few months. It will be difficult to get out when it starts snowing, as some roads close in the winter around here. What I can visit, though, I'll make when it's nice.

In any case, I'll be back at it within the next day or two, shooting from the hip as usual. Even the Drifter has to have a moment of peace every so often.