Lego Vatican proves a useful distraction for Catholic priest

A 51-year-old priest has spent ten months making a model-sized version of The Vatican.

Father Bob Simon, of St. Catherine of Siena Parish in Pennsylvania, built the 14-by-6-foot "Lego Vatican" as a featured display at the Franklin Institute Science Museum in Philadelphia as part of its "Vatican Splendours" exhibit.

"It's a thrill," he told Catholic News Service at the well-known museum in late October, as he inspected his Lego Vatican and made sure all of the pieces were in place.

"Never thought I would have something (I created) in a museum ... and certainly never thought that my little Lego project that I did in an empty room in the rectory would attract a lot of attention from a lot of people."

"Wow, did you really build this with Legos all by yourself?" one girl asked, followed by boy asking how long it took to complete the Lego rendition of St. Peter's Basilica?

"It took me 10 months to complete," Father Simon told the growing crowd. 

The Lego Vatican actually wasn't built as a museum exhibit, but as a piece for a Lego show in the summer of 2015.

Word about the elaborately detailed Lego replica of St. Peter's Basilica reached curators at the Franklin Institute, who asked to show it during their special Vatican showcase in honour of Pope Francis' US visit.

The Lego Vatican at the Franklin Institute in Philadelphia (CNS)

As a 5-year-old boy, his love for Lego was equalled by a desire to join the priesthood: he used to pretend to be a priest, donning a cassock made by his mother and was ordained a priest in 1990.

Eight years ago, Father Simon was sent to Moscow in Pennsylvania's Pocono Mountains, a parish with a large and active community.

He discovered that he needed a hobby to cope with the hectic calendar and at first picked up painting, but found that the setup and cleanup wasn't well matched with the short sessions his schedule often allowed.

That's when the Lego boxes started to be moved out of storage and into a spare room in the rectory. 

"It's something I found I could do at 9 o'clock at night when all of the appointments and meetings are over at the end of the day," he said.

"It's something I can do for an hour or two or simply for a half an hour. It's something that isn't that hard to get back to when the telephone rings or if I'm called out to the hospital."

It also peaked the curiosity of his parishioners, fellow clergy and even his bishop, all of whom frequently stopped by the rectory to check out the Lego-building progress.

While many seemed surprised the priest had taken on such an ambitious project, his mother saw it as a natural fit for her son.

"She said, 'You built a replica of St. Peter's Basilica as a boy, so of course you'll do it again now,'" Father Simon said. "It was a no-brainer for her."

Father Simon's next project, he told CNS, is to build a replica of the Sistine Chapel.