Posts Tagged With: church in the attic

Amsterdam, Netherlands Sept 9

We are embarking on a 2.5 week trip to Europe to celebrate our 50th wedding anniversary. The highlight will be a River cruise from Amsterdam to Budapest. These posts may look different since we are not bringing a tablet computer only a smart phone.

By the time we arrived, had our passport checked, met the Viking cruise reps and made it to our hotel room, it was 2 pm local time. We resisted the desire to take a nap and went exploring instead. Several possible destinations were on our list for the afternoon but we focused on one museum and it’s neighborhood. The Museum of Our Lord in the Attic.

In 1578 the Netherlands tossed out Catholic Spain as a ruler and became an independent Protestant country. Overnight Catholicism was outlawed and churches went underground. However the Dutch had developed a remarkable tolerance for differences in society and these underground churches were tolerated as long as they did not flaunt their rule breaking. This same tolerant attitude had an impact in the open acceptance in the development of New York City during Dutch rule in the early half of the 1600s. It continues today in the Amsterdam acceptance of red light districts and the sale of marijuana.

We spent the rest of our afternoon wandering some of the streets of central Amsterdam, admiring the canals and the architecture of buildings, and learning to dodge bicycles and scooters.

We celebrated our anniversary with a very nice dinner in our hotel restaurant and made it to bed by 10 pm.

Saturday will bring more adventure.

Ed and Chris

Amsterdam Netherlands

September 10, 2022