Religious business 101: build a giant statue and expect people to flock to see it, and you make money by selling them tickets, food, housing, and tchotchkes.
Quote:
Europe's largest statue of the Virgin Mary, measuring 55.6 metres (182 feet), ahead of its official opening to the public set for the Feast of the Assumption in the village of Konotopie, near Torun, Poland, July 29, 2026. The monument, funded by billionaire couple Grazyna and Roman Karkosik, is expected to become a major religious landmark and tourist attraction.
![[Image: 800x800.webp]](https://i.postimg.cc/m2sPv4c4/800x800.webp)
teachings of the Bible are so muddled and self-contradictory that it was possible for Christians to happily burn heretics alive for five long centuries. It was even possible for the most venerated patriarchs of the Church, like St. Augustine and St. Thomas Aquinas, to conclude that heretics should be tortured (Augustine) or killed outright (Aquinas). Martin Luther and John Calvin advocated the wholesale murder of heretics, apostates, Jews, and witches. - Sam Harris, "Letter To A Christian Nation"
