HOLY COW

This is the barn like structure that was recently opened as the Billy Graham Library in Charlotte, North Carolina.

Check it out: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18954810/

But in the Library/Museum there is a talking cow. Now I know that Billy Graham was raised on a dairy farm, and I assume that his boyhood is the source of the theme of the Library. But a talking cow?

"Christianity Today" says about the cow: "And then there's the talking cow. Despite some who question its seriousness, Franklin Graham calls it "fantastic." He said the cow offers a spiel about cows and Billy Graham, then challenges children to answer questions about the museum on a card they'll be given at the start. There are prizes waiting at the finish."

MSNBC said, "To the right is a cow shed, where a display that has drawn the most curiosity stands. An animatronic black-and-white cow named Bessie says in a Southern drawl that Graham has been “preaching the pure milk of God’s word for 60 years.” Bessie tells kids to “get moo-ving” to learn more about the preacher." Some have called it the Golden Calf exhibit.

Now, I looked, and I looked, but I couldn't find an image available of the "talking cow' at the library. So I threw in this picture of Chatty Belle, a talking cow that live in Wisconsin rather than North Carolina. Check it out when you are in the area: http://www.worldslargestthings.com/wisconsin/chattybelle.htm

Billy Graham has always been an ambivalent figure for me. I know he has done an enormous amount of good and has pointed many to the kingdom of heaven. But in the past just about the time I began to have positive vibes towards him I saw him with Nixon, or heard him say something dumb, like Aids was punishment for immorality. Now his son is operating in the same vein with his comments about New Orleans and such.

The library looks like a nice place even if it is built on the theme of a dairy barn.

It may be the only barn I have ever seen with such a large cross for a door. It is the cow though that intrigues me the most. Generally when I couple a cow and religion together in my mind I come up with the Hindu's and their Brahma cattle wandering the streets of India, while the populace goes hungry for protein. Or I reach back to the Egyptian gods and come up with Hathor the mother goddess of the whole world who was shown as a cow with the disk of the sun between her horns. Then there was the corollary to Harthor the bull god Apis, who in other forms finally made it to Rome in the temple of Isis and the caves of Mithera( such as the Vatican) where rich people could be "washed in the blood of the bull" (poorer types had to do with goats or sheep). So I guess there is a long precedence to having a bovine in a religious place. I predict that the cow will become the icon of his library intended or not.