D.C. officially gets major Bible museum

WASHINGTON — A major Bible museum officially joined other large museums along and near Washington’s National Mall late last week, with faith and political leaders offering sometimes passionate prayers for the institution to bring people closer to God and the text.

The $500 million, dramatic-looking Museum of the Bible will be one of the largest institutions focused on religion in the District of Columbia, considered one of the world’s major museum cities. Its arrival as the country becomes more polarized about issues around religious diversity and religious freedoms has made the museum — and its evangelical board — a flashpoint for debate, skepticism and inspiration, depending on one’s view.

But the mood inside the private dedication ceremony at the state-of-the art theater of the museum was one of joy and worship. While organizers have said for months that the content of the museum will be shaped by an academic, non-sectarian and open approach, the day was about Judeo-Christian evangelistic hopes for the eightstory, 430,000-square-foot project.

It is now open to the public and is free.

For visitors, may “their ears, hearts and minds be open to the good news that pores forth from its pages,” Cardinal Donald Wuerl, Washington’s Catholic archbishop, told the crowd in a message from Pope Francis.

“Hallow this moment, open this door to reveal how active and alive your word has been through the centuries,” Adm. Margaret Kibben, chief of the U.S. Navy chaplains, prayed to the audience of nearly 500 people.

“It has had a positive impact on their lives in so many different ways. Hopefully [visitors will] be inspired to open it, get to know it better. Have you read your Bible today?” asked Steve Green, the chairman of the museum’s board, the president of the Hobby Lobby craft store chain and one of the founders of the museum after becoming a major collector of biblical artifacts.

The ceremony began with “Amazing Grace” sung by gospel star CeCe Winans. After that, the 10 speakers prayed, sermonized and told stories of the Bible’s impact on their own lives, on American politics and law and on Christian and Jewish history. That impact was presented reverentially, and almost always positively, but at times also aspirationally - as though some speakers were praying for the institution to somehow highlight the most unifying aspects of the Bible in a country where religion seems increasingly used as a scythe.

“Are there any passage or words more uplifting than: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself. Justice, justice shall you pursue… Am I my brother’s keeper’… ‘Nation shall not lift up sword against nation’ ?” said Rabbi Stuart Weinblatt, a Potomac, Maryland, rabbi and leader of the Jewish Federations of North America’s Rabbinic Cabinet. “May people come here and grow and be inspired,” Weinblatt told the crowd.”

Other speakers included: Longtime Senate Chaplain Barry Black, a Seventh-day Adventist; museum director Tony Zeiss, museum president Cary Summers and District Mayor Muriel Bowser, who said such a museum was “appropriate” for a bustling global capital.

“I thought the word of God and everyone who can express it and bring those words alive [are] God’s gift to all of us,” she said.

Of the 10 speakers, two were Israeli government officials - Ambassador to the U.S. Ron Dermer and Tourism Minister Yarir Levin.