Yesterday I went with friends to Sodom -- a little community not far from our farm as the crow flies, but, as the car travels, about 45 minutes away -- high up and reached by a very winding road.
According to the story, Sodom got its name about a century ago when a visiting Methodist minister, appalled by the free and easy ways of the inhabitants, said that they were no better than a bunch of Sodomites.
Officially. the place is called Revere but the residents cling proudly to the old name.
This trip came under the heading of research -- in my chapter of the collaborative novel I'm currently working on, my characters pay a visit to Sodom. And since it's been about thirty years since I was there, I thought I ought to take a look again before I wrote about it.
The Church of the Little Flower is kind of unexpected. It was the home of a Roman Catholic mission that operated from 1931 into, I think, the seventies -- here in this mountain fastness where the majority of churches are some flavor of Baptist.
In fact, today the church is owned by a Baptist. But he was evidently so moved by the feeling the building invokes, that rather than turn it into a vacation home, as had been his original intent, he restored it. And today it's available for meetings or special events.
I have a lot more to tell you about Sodom -- but as I doubt I'll be among the elect raptured away tomorrow, I'll save it for another post.
