At last count, more than 150,000 visitors since the May 28 grand opening have made the pilgrimage to this $27 million marvel located about 25 miles from Cincinnati. They’ve traveled from nearly every state in the nation. They’ve traveled from overseas. They’ve traveled by car, plane and train.
Turns out Ken Ham was right. If you build it, they will come.
It’s less certain whether Ham thought the CM would be so controversial, but given the nature of the beast – in this case, a dinosaur living at the same time as man – it’s safe to assume that the former Australian school teacher turned “Young Earth” lightning rod knew what he was getting himself into.
Not that he minds. The more commotion stirred up through the comparison of creationism to evolution, the more exposure the museum receives. The more exposure, the more visitors who arrive. And the more visitors, the more souls that can be saved.
So bring on the “bad” press, the protesting scientists, the airplanes trailing banners that include: “Thou Shalt Not Lie.” Ham is ready for it all. The president of the Answers in Genesis ministry simply points people toward the first book of the Bible and asks:
“Is America getting better or worse? Is the compromise really working?”
Those questions have nagged at Ham since 1980, when he began contemplating the idea of a creationism museum to impress upon people the importance of Biblical authority. Twenty-seven years later, Ham’s dream became reality in the dirt of northern Kentucky.
The museum, located on 49 acres, is a mixture of ancient and modern: exhibits depicting Adam and Eve complete with the latest in audio-visual technology. A planetarium. Outdoor trails and fossil bones. It is impressive to say the least.
Live chameleons share space with a scale cutout of Noah’s ark. The serpent in the Garden of Eden tempts on one side of a walkway while Moses stands tall not far off.
And everywhere there are signs reminding guests that they have two choices when determining historical truth: God’s Word or human reason. So choose wisely.
On a wall a sign reads: Human philosophy says “I think, therefore I am.” Biblical truth, meanwhile, makes clear of God that “I am that I am.”
That struggle between following the mind of God and the mind of man is largely the reason so much emotion is brought to the table when creationists come face to face with evolutionists, whether they be Christians or not.
It is why more than 800 scientists from Kentucky, Ohio and Indiana signed a “statement of concern” about the museum, and why a physics/astronomy professor from Cleveland rated the museum a 4 out of 5 for technology – 5 being best – and a 5 for propaganda and negative 5 for content.
“Evolutionists get red in the face and the proverbial steam comes out of their ears, because in essence we’re challenging their whole world view, that there is meaning to life,” said Mark Looy, vice president of Answers in Genesis.
And yet both Looy and Ham insist their chief aims are evangelism and emphasis on the authority of scripture
“It’s not that we’re insisting on a (literal) six days of creation,” Ham said. “It’s we’re insisting you take God at his word.”
Ham shared a meeting he had with humanist Eugene Scott, an anthropologist and executive director of the National Center for Science Education, which stands against creationism and intelligent design.
“She sat right there,” Ham said, pointing to a padded chair in his museum office, “And she said, ‘Ken, I know a lot of people of faith who have no trouble believing in evolution and millions of years (age of the earth).’ I said to her, ‘Dr. Scott, would you agree they can’t believe in millions of years if they take Genesis as literal history?’ She agreed. In other words, she knows. If taken as written, it’s six days. Secularists know that.”
