God(s): user's guide and a pileated woodpecker

This morning, I left Parliament Hill to go see the media preview of the new exhibit God(s): A User's Guide at the Canadian Museum of Civilization.

That journey from my shared desk in Centre Block requires a journey down to "the Pit." We journalists have some spaces in a parking lot by the Ottawa River at the foot of the Hill. Getting to the lot requires going down about five flights of wooden stairs down a steep hillside.

Hence, its name.

Pileated woodpecker on the slope to "the Pit"

Today, as I was heading for my car, I saw a huge Pileated Woodpecker flying from tree to tree on the hillside. He stuck around long enough for me to take a photo. (I think it may be a she now that I've checked the Wiki-link above. )

There was also a black squirrel who had a crumpled piece of newspaper in his paws and looked like he was reading, but missed getting a photo of him.

God(s) User's Guide was quite interesting. Especially good for those who want to see universal themes in all religions. What was especially cool about the exhibit is the effort the museum went to display religious artifacts from various faiths that have been in used in Canada by different faiths.

There was a Dancing Shiva the curator found in a Byward Market restaurant and the Torah Ark that used to hold the Scrolls in a Jewish Synagogue of some 2,000 members in Glace Bay, Nova Scotia.

Don Butler of the Ottawa Citizen already has his report up:

Why an exhibit on God? "We realized that people are getting a lot of information about religion in the media, a lot of it about controversies that are going on," Inglis replies. "We thought as part of our educational mandate and as part of trying to understand the evolution of culture in Canada that religion would be an interesting topic for us to tackle.

"What we're really hoping is that people will see this as an element of civilization, that they'll be re-energized to think about religion as an important aspect of culture and tradition, and that they'll learn some elements about other religions."

If that's not reason enough, consider the rationale offered by the exhibit's website. "Migration, globalization and communication," it says, "may well make religion one of the key issues of the 21st century."

The basic framework of God(s), A User's Guide originated with a museum in Brussels. The version here was adapted by the Museum of Civilization and its counterpart in Quebec City, the Musee de la civilization, where it completed a 10-month run in September.

Every artifact from the European exhibition has been replaced by 225 sacred objects and artifacts used by Canadians of different religious faiths. "It adds a whole dimension to the exhibit that makes it more relevant to our own experience," Inglis says.