CREEDE HINSHAW: Humans, dinosaurs co-exist at Noah’s Ark attraction

The second Noah’s Ark has been built in Kentucky. You can see it for $40.

One might have thought the developers could have beached the ark on a mountain – Denali in Alaska or Pike’s Peak or Stone Mountain in Georgia, where the proposed statue of Martin Luther King Jr., could stand on the deck looking down on Stonewall Jackson.

This ark is – to use political language – really huge: a $102 million project, 510 feet long, and higher than the Statue of Liberty. Longer than one and a half football fields, it could contain the White House. Twice.

The endeavor eventually prevailed in a lawsuit lasting longer than 40 days and nights over whether Kentucky could use taxpayer money to support a religious theme park requiring its employees to believe the Bible literally. Kentucky won the fight with this brilliant argument: If it was legal to subsidize the Kentucky bourbon museum, it should be legal to subsidize Noah’s Ark.

Ken Ham, the Christian behind this venture, said he believes every word in the King James Bible is literally and scientifically true. He wants to convince visitors that the world is only 6,000 years old, along the lines of the long-discredited calculation of Archbishop Ussher that God created the world on October 23, 4004 BC at 9 a.m.

According to these literalists, humans and dinosaurs lived together on the earth and every geological feature on earth, the Grand Canyon, the Rocky Mountains, etc., is only 6,000 years old. I’m not sure where Neanderthal man fits, but I’m sure they have an answer.

If you visit the Kentucky ark, you will see dinosaurs in cages, a worldview rejected by most of the Christian community along with almost every reputable biologist, archaeologist and physicist, many of whom are Christians.

At least one tour company offers a five-day, four-night bus trip to the ark and other attractions — $499 per person, double occupancy … should we say two-by-two? The brochure promises the ark is “bigger than imagination,” a description I don’t understand. Everything about Ark Encounter is imagination: the conveyor belts Noah used to feed the animals, the skin color of Mr. and Mrs. Noah, their waste disposal system, Noah’s cozy ark library and the precise number of 7,000 animals the display claims morphed into — without evolution — today’s amazing plethora of life. It’s all — as they say in Hollywood — based on a true story.

The Ark Encounter’s admission price may seem as steep as the ramps Noah needed to coax those dinosaurs inside. You can also visit on Sunday, a curious decision by a man who takes his Bible literally. Truett Cathy closed Chick Fil-A on the Sabbath.

A visit to this park isn’t in my future, but I salute Mr. Ham’s evangelical zeal. Even if one doesn’t take Genesis 6-9 literally, and many people still do, one suspects our 4.6 billion-year-old planet is close to exceeding the wickedness of Noah’s day. Reflection on today’s world leads one to ask with Jesus, “When the Son of Man returns will he find faith on earth?” (Luke 18:8)

Email columnist Creede Hinshaw at [email protected].