Saturday evening, as I was wandering Grant Park, I got a call from my friend Mark, the minister-to-be, saying he had arrived in Chicago from Kansas City and was ready to get together. Not much later, he retrieved me from the park and we went for dinner in another part of town. The next morning Mark and I met for a late breakfast near the seminary he was visiting in the University of Chicago area. After downing a few tasty pancakes, I suggested we tour the Museum of Science and Industry, a fantastic museum only two or three blocks away.

As we entered the MSI and bought our tickets, we stopped to examine an old streamlined train, the Pioneer Zephyr. Taking the escalators up to the primary level, we took part in a special exhibit about how movies are made. (See next page). Following that, we experienced a large-format motion picture called "Forces of Nature" in one of those huge spherical IMAX theaters.

Once we finished several hours of movie-related activities we settled in to viewing the regular attractions at the MSI. Leaving the IMAX theater we paused to look over the space-related artifacts. These included the used Apollo 8 and Aurora 7 space capsules. Our next journey took us to the aircraft carrier / submarine exhibit where Mark tried out a flight simulator. Entering the great ground-floor hall, which has a number of aircraft suspended from the ceiling, we came across a large, newly constructed model train layout. Ascending one of MSI's four stairwells, Mark and I rediscovered a favorite display, the thinly-sliced human body sections.

On the upper level, we inspected a cut-away, full-sized Boeing 272, a wall depicting the chemical elements and their uses, some interesting information on galaxies and genetics, a room explaining the workings of the human brain, and a large, walk-through model of a person's heart. A very special exhibit consisted of a long row of containers, each housing a real human fetus at some stage of development. These proceeded in chronological order from microscopic embryo to full-term baby. I often wonder how people feel about these, but seeing as how the exhibit has been there for many years, it's value must supersede any visitor complaints.

In a side note, the Museum of Science and Industry turned out to be an interesting place to take a student of religion. At one point, as we were passing by a timeline of scientific advances, Mark started to inject a few salient points. To paraphrase: "Here is where the Church had their difficulties with Galileo and Copernicus." "Here is where the printing press spread scientific knowledge faster than the Church could keep pace." "Here is where the Protestants diversified and started hacking, burning and torturing each other as heretics." His comments were extremely fascinating.