Celestial Event Adds Dimension To Christmas

The moon and the planet Venus are giving North America a Christmas card this holiday, conjuring up the biblical story of how a bright object in the sky led three wise men to the infant Jesus.

If the sky is clear, Venus - in its three-quarter phase - should be visible Christmas night just below the 2-day-old crescent moon for about one to one-and-a-half hours after sunset.

“It’s going to kind of look like the kind of thing you have seen on Christmas cards for the past 100 years,” said Jack Horkheimer, executive director of the Miami Planetarium. “This is one of those wonderful events that, even if you are in a brilliantly lit up city, it will be visible.”

The close juxtaposition of the two near Christmas occurs about every 25 years, Horkheimer said.