The Holy Land Experience came to an end on August 2, when it was sold to a Seventh-day Adventist health care company for $32 million. Religious anthropologist James Bielo, who studies places that “ materialize the Bible,” said the Holy Land Experience was arguably the most famous of the biblical replicas in the US, even though it always struggled to survive. While the “living biblical museum” attracted attention, controversy, and not a few visitors willing to pay the $17, then $29, and ultimately $50 ticket prices, the Holy Land Experience couldn’t find a firm financial footing.įor the last few years of its existence, it had annual operating deficits of about $5 million, with no one willing to step up to cover that as a ministry cost. The reenactments of resurrection, scale miniature model of first-century Jerusalem, animatronic John Wycliffe, and the Trin-i-tee mini golf course were never enough. Evangelical visionaries imagined a family entertainment experience that could pull at least a portion of Orlando’s annual visitors from the mouse’s magic kingdom to the kingdom of God.īut it never quite worked. The 14-acre park was once conceived as Christian competition for Walt Disney World. The dream of a Bible theme park died in Florida last week, after 20 years of innovation and renovation-not to mention cash infusions, cost cuts, and rate hikes-failed to make the Holy Land Experience financially sustainable.
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