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Badlands To The Bone
Do new riders attend because they feel convicted after days of debauchery, which can include bikini contests and ShotSkis of liquor? Do the Badlands turn them good?
Castor said he doesn’t know. He leaves the how’s and why’s to the Holy Spirit.
In general,he said he’s found most of his summertime congregants to be kindhearted, devout and respectful people of faith.
“I really love this community,” he said. “There’s a stereotype, but they’re really fine people.”
They are men like Horacio Vela, 72, of south Texas.
He said he has attended mass in Sturgis nearly every Sunday the last 33 times he has attended the motorcycle rally.
“Almost every year,” he said.
Standing well over 6-feet, Vela is a retired U.S. Border Patrol officer with an imposing frame. But whenasked why he attends church during his vacations to Sturgis, his eyes welled up and he broke down with tears as he conveyed his gratefulness to God.
Tucked in his 2017 Harley-Davidson Ultra’s glovebox was a brown-beaded rosary he doesn’t ride without.
“Everywhere I go the Lord is with me,” he said. “Right now, I’m riding alone, but I know Christ Savior is always with me.”
Lowell Foos, a 74-year-old in a black leather Harley-Davidson riding jacket, said he attends the mass out of habit.
“I just do it every Sunday at home,” said Foos, who is from Kansas. “That, and my wife would chew my ass out if I didn’t go.”
https://cowboystatedaily.com/2024/08/04/sundays-are-for-the-spiritual-even-sturgis-motorcycle-rally-hellraisers/