Retreat to a 1960s Top Secret Facility

We seminarians are again gathered back at Kenrick Seminary in St Louis, about to start another semester. Before each spring semester begins, seminarians all go on five-day silent (no talking) retreats. This year my class went to the National Shrine of Our Lady of the Snows, which is near Belleville, Illinois. We stayed in the nice hotel on the grounds, had a private chapel set up in one of the conference rooms, and we were given conferences by Bishop Sample from the Diocese of Marquette, Michigan. The talks were excellent and the retreat was overall quite good. I did get sick for a few days of the retreat, but it was still a good experience.

The Shrine is a strange place. There is a very nice conference center, restaurant, and hotel that are all quite busy. The rest of the 200 or so acres is taken up by various "devotional areas," such as Stations of the Cross, a statue of Our Lady of Guadalupe, a "Resurrection Garden," and so on. Apparently there is even a retirement community.

But by far the most interesting structure is the "Main Shrine." It was constructed in 1960 or 61 as a massive outdoor worship amphitheater. There is a tabernacle, altar, and so on out front for the celebration of outdoor Mass. Towering over the whole thing is a huge tripod that resembles an "M" (for Mary) no matter what direction you are viewing from. Here, see what I mean:

Behind the front sanctuary and altar, inside the structure, there is an indoor area called the "Mary Chapel," which is just wild:

And behind the main altar of the Shrine, down below, there is a series of "Rosary Courts" in which each of the Rosary mysteries (except the Luminous Mysteries, which had not been established in the 1960s) is depicted in a very nice mosaic. The Sorrowful Mysteries are enclosed in the nicest chapel on the property, in my opinion, though I didn't get a very nice picture of it:

Walking around the shrine was almost surreal at times. It was like, as one classmate put it, wandering around some abandoned city (on another planet, I might add). The place was mostly empty, but fully operational. The heat and lights were on, so it was pleasing to walk into the small, empty chapels to pray in solitude. There are door and passageways leading to different areas. To get the layout down, some exploring was required.

All that exploring was fun, but I saw a few things that made me suspicious. Shhh ... Personally, I think the "Shrine" is a massive cover operation for some large, underground, top-secret facility. I came to this theory while walking (not praying at that time, mind you) somewhere around station 12 or 13 of the Stations of the Cross. In that area there is a curiously unmarked doorway in the side of the hill. As I walked toward it to investigate, a Shrine "Security" vehicle drove by. Strange, I thought. And, to me, the giant tripod atop the Shrine, combined with the enormous outdoor amphitheater, seems as if it would function well as a giant antenna of some kind.

I know you are either thinking 1) You're crazy or 2) Weren't you supposed to be praying? I probably am crazy and, don't worry, I had a lot of time to pray during the retreat. If you're ever in the area, the Shrine is a neat place to visit. Check it out.

In an unrelated note, I am starting to work on the travel logs for my trip to Omaha (last May) and the recently completed trip from El Paso to Del Rio. Some day I'll get them done, don't worry.