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| Banner of the 2015 Creche Exhibit at The Knights of Columbus Museum in New Haven CT. |
Sunday I visited the Knights of Columbus Museum to see their annual creche exhibit. If you can't make it to the museum, the exhibit announcement includes a nice slide show as well as a worthwhile video (approximately 5 minutes). I love this museum because it is FREE, has FREE PARKING, and has interesting exhibits. I spent a couple hours here this time.
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| View of the main entrance to the museum. Note the moon in the upper left of the picture. |
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| Close-up of the exhibit banner on the outside of the museum. |
When I arrived, I was glad to see a couple familiar faces: Jess Mallory (one of the Visitor Guides) and Olga (the manager of the gift shop {practically an exhibit in itself}). Don Adams, another long-time Visitor Guide, retired since my last visit and is now in Florida. Jess told me that with the recent announcement of Mother Teresa's impending canonization, he has been praying for her intercession for a number of petitions for various people. He kindly added my name to his dish of names next to a relic of Mother Teresa.
The creche exhibit is housed, as usual, in the two main exhibit rooms on the main floor, next to the Gift Shop. There was also another room at the top of the stairs where several creches belonging to the Knights were displayed. I wanted to see this before Christmas in order to reflect on the true meaning of Christmas.
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| This is one of my favorites. |
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| Wide-eyed group. |
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| Copter Creche |
I really like the concept behind this "Copter Creche." The base of the creche tower contains 6 candle holders. The heat from the candles will rise and cause the propeller on top to spin. This moves a spindle in the middle which turns a plate on each level. I would love to see this in action!
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| This creche is made from corn husks. |
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| Polish |
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| I call this a race track creche. It is also reminiscent of Jacob's Ladder (Gen 28, 12; John 1, 51). |
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| Creche in a nut shell (literally). |
Last year I timed my visit to coincide with the annual Christmas Tree Festival. The front page of the museum web site has links to pictures of the trees, list of awards, and a short video clip. These are RC elementary school kids who come in and decorate trees. All are interesting and the creativity of some are impressive.
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| 2015 Christmas Tree Festival (courtesy KofC Museum FB) |
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| The Sword of Truth over Error and Ignorance. |
This "Sword of Truth" illustration (see above) was my favorite of the exhibit. You probably would not see anything like this today due to all sin being minimized and downplayed during this "Year of Mercy".
Overall, it was another blessing to be able to enjoy the Knights of Columbus Museum and annual Creche and Christmas Tree exhibits. Perhaps I will visit the Creche exhibit again in January before it closes.
Links:
http://www.kofcmuseum.org
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nativity_scene
http://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/its-official-mother-teresa-is-going-to-be-canonized-26320
http://www.usccb.org/prayer-and-worship/liturgical-year/christmas/
http://ricketwrite.blogspot.com/2014/12/buon-natale-at-k-of-c.html
http://www.kofc.org/un/en/columbia/index.html
http://www.kofcmuseum.org/km/en/exhibits/2015/columbia/index.html
http://ricketwrite.blogspot.com/2012/07/due-to-bad-weather-we-had-change-in.html
http://www.im.va/content/gdm/en/giubileo/annuncio.html
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Written Tuesday 22 December 2015
