⇒ From Dispatch.com ⇒
By Danae King, The Columbus Dispatch
After more than a year of being closed, the Jubilee Museum and Catholic Cultural Center in Columbus will reopen in a new location in the spring.
The Catholic museum, founded in 1998 by a priest, will reopen in about six months in the Catholic Foundation building, 257 E. Broad St., Downtown, said Diocesan Chancellor Deacon Thomas Berg.
The museum, a part of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Columbus, houses numerous artifacts of religious life locally and globally.
“This is a very exciting move for us and we’re looking forward to being able to open up in the near future,” said Shawn Kenney, museum director.
The museum closed in August 2019 to restructure, do inventory and repair a leaky roof at its Franklinton location in the old Holy Family high school at 57 S. Grubb St., Kenney said.
It was ready to reopen in March, but leaders decided to hold off due to the COVID-19 pandemic, he said.
The new location will offer benefits the old one did not, including a handicap-accessible space, a street-level entrance and temperature-controlled rooms to preserve its artifacts, Kenney said. The building itself is historic as well, as it housed the first Wendy’s restaurant location and its corporate headquarters.
Loren Brown, CEO and president of the Catholic Foundation, said the organization had been using the space for storage, waiting for a tenant that relates to its mission.
It found that in the museum.
“This is a natural fit for us, too, in having something that is much aligned with our Catholic faith,” Brown said. There’s a “synergy it brings between our donors, as well as the Catholic community and the public in general, to see the rich history of what our Catholic faith has done in our diocese.”
Loren Brown, CEO and president of the Catholic Foundation, said the organization had been using the space for storage, waiting for a tenant that relates to its mission.
Museum perfect fit for Catholic Foundation site owner
It found that in the museum.
“This is a natural fit for us, too, in having something that is much aligned with our Catholic faith,” Brown said. There’s a “synergy it brings between our donors, as well as the Catholic community and the public in general, to see the rich history of what our Catholic faith has done in our diocese.”
The space is smaller than its previous space, though Kenney said that’s OK because the museum has refined its collections.
Volunteers and staff inventoried all the pieces and are keeping only the objects that are museum-quality, he said. There are plans to allow the public in to see pieces that are “neat,” but not museum-quality and those pieces will be available for a donation, Kenney said.
Other items, including altars and paintings, were given away to convents and new religious orders moving into the diocese for their use, Kenney said.
“The museum’s mission is preserving the Catholic mind and memory,” Kenney said. “The goal was not to keep them there long-term, but to get them out to be used for the purpose they were intended for.”
The museum has also sent items to a cathedral being built in Nigeria and to other churches around the world, he said.
One exhibit, Kenney’s personal favorite, will still be in the museum when it reopens. Donated from the Franciscan Monastery of the Holy Land, the exhibit features vestments, coins from the time of Christ and a second century Roman spear. There is also a chalice featuring an amethyst and pearl stone that was originally part of a necklace belonging to Mary Queen of Scots, Kenney said.
“We have a spectacular collection,” Kenney said. “When this museum started it just started as a little project, and it’s turned into something nobody expected. It’s really a treasure.”
The museum is popular during the holiday season for its nativity scenes, which it won’t be able to show this year, though Kenney is hoping to post photos of different nativities with descriptions online during the days of the Advent, he said.
Kenney is also planning for one of its first exhibits in its new location to feature a Lego church a volunteer is currently building.
In 2018, the museum showed a piece from a Pennsylvania priest, the Rev. Bob Simon, who had constructed a replica of the Vatican in Rome using 500,000 Legos.
“People love Legos,” Kenney said.
He said he’s hoping — pandemic allowing — that the museum can host Lego-building workshops, allow people to buy Lego kits to build their favorite religious monument or church and have competitions for building the best Lego creations.
Kenney said he’s happy with the new museum location Downtown, near the diocesan offices and St. Joseph Cathedral.
Brown agreed.
“Now we’re offering the public another reason to come Downtown and want to be on Broad Street,” Brown said, mentioning other Downtown attractions like the Columbus Museum of Art, the cathedral and historic churches.
Part of the museum’s mission is to evangelize, and Kenney says it does that through education and exposure to the faith through art and artifacts.
“It’s a place for everybody and I want people to know that,” he said. “Please come in and see.”
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