Strap on your helmet and pump up your tires because you’ll soon be able to make a Marian Pilgrimage by peddling your bike across America!
The Great American Rail-Trail is a more than 3,700-mile-long bike trail currently being created in the United States.
Using both existing and soon-to-be paved bike paths between Washington, D.C. and Seattle, Washington, this bike trail will provide access to small towns, major landmarks, and breathtaking nature across America.
In a widely successful Instagram reel created last week, Sam Bently, an influencer who built his platform on sharing happy and encouraging news from around the world, highlighted the Great American Rail-Trail and shed light on a little-known Catholic site along the route.
About Our Lady of the Rockies
Our Lady of the Rockies sits atop a mountain peak in Butte, Montana. This small town looks up at the 90-foot-tall statue of Mary that has a miraculous background.
ChurchPOP contributor Matthew Sewell wrote about this statue in 2016:
“One of the most picturesque views in Montana comes into focus when rounding the bend on eastbound Interstate 90, about six miles from the historic city of Butte... the third-tallest statue in America... brilliantly white and perched 3500 feet above the valley floor, known as Our Lady of the Rockies.”
Sewell detailed the countless miraculous stories that came along with the construction of this glorious icon.
“Her story began in 1979 with Butte resident Bob O’Bill, whose wife was nearing death from cancer,” he begins.
After praying for her healing and promising to build a small statue of Mary in his yard if she recovered, prayers were answered and her cancer disappeared!
Eventually, the plan to make a small statue grew to be a plan with a grand vision of creating the much larger statue that now exists.
In the building process, inexplicable numbers of donations of time, money, and resources were given to the builders. Men with no experience or qualifications to construct such statues managed to perfectly execute the plan.
Just like the Apostles, who were not originally equipped for the call God had for their lives, these men were transformed into the builders God needed to fulfill the construction of this statue.
Now, still standing almost 30 years later, Our Lady of the Rockies may become the next greatest American Pilgrimage site as the Great American Rail-Trail creates the opportunity to bring her many visitors.