This is the first in an occasional series of travelogue/photo essays on seeing and experiencing intersections of faith, history and culture — on seeing new and old communities of faith.
On Friday, Sue and I drove around the Missouri River Valley of Central Missouri just east of our state capital of Jefferson City, an area settled and farmed largely by 19th– and 20th-century German immigrants. They were drawn to the area, in large part, by its fertile river valley and its similarities to their homeland, and the marks they left on the landscape are still present in the cleared and plowed fields, a few old stone buildings, and their churches — both Catholic and Protestant – whose spires spring up from the land as you approach any village or town on the narrow, winding roads. Always, there is a church steeple signaling the existence of a community.
We hit just a few towns on this short road trip. When I see the town of Frankenstein on the map, I know we have to go see it. Besides the intrigue of the name, I have been there before many years ago when I was a child, as friends of our family owned a “country place” not far away up Highway 100 in Osage County. There’s not much to see now in Frankenstein, if there ever was, but its Catholic Church – Our Lady, Help of Christians – is a
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