Back in 2010 I posted on the Creation Museum in Kentucky and the grandiose plan to build a Noah’s Ark Amusement Park nearby. It was supposed to open in 2014 but it seems that fund-raising hasn’t gone as planned. If the state of Kentucky would go beyond the tax-breaks it has already given and just provide direct funding, in the secular interest of promoting “commerce,” perhaps the $126 million ark park could get built.
For those wondering how things are going, FT’s Barney Jopson provides an in-depth look at the project and talks with those involved. You have to read it to believe it (the slideshow is good too). While talking to one of principals Jopson asks a poignant, albeit impertinent, question:
I asked whether the Ark Encounter did not risk undermining the Bible, particularly in the minds of children, by associating it with the fairy tales behind other theme parks. No, he said. It will be fun, but it will be clear that it is a “historical” park. “They are real accounts of real history – and if so, you may begin to think that, gee, evolution is a bunch of hogwash.”
Setting aside for a moment the issue of “real history,” I’m not sure this park will be all that much fun for the kids. Here is the park designer discussing themes:
He said he had watched humans “become more sensual, more dangerous, more self-centred” – just as they did in the licentious society punished by the biblical flood. As a reminder, before park visitors reach the ark they will walk through a stucco-walled sin city filled with the evils of pre-flood society, which he has decided will include prostitution, torture and cage fighting. On the other side will be a Tower of Babel and a ride themed on the plagues unleashed on Egypt, among them a river of blood and swarms of locusts. “We basically have retribution through this whole thing,” Marsh said.
Sounds like good times! There is nothing like a bit of retribution to go along with cotton candy and water slides. Tubing the river of blood should be special.
What was I saying the other day about the myth of mythopoeic eras? Creationist Christians never cease to amaze or amuse.
If the park is all about retribution, they should consider building two arks — one for mammals and the other for soon to be extinct “missionary lizards”:
