The Buddha of Tourism

The other day me and my mum were talking about the issues of turning religious objects into commercial ventures. She likes to stay in an abbey converted into a commercial hotel.

The Big Buddha in Hong Kong was apparently made in 1997 specifically to be a tourist attraction (and to put good feng shui stuff on Hong Kong, apparently.) At first this seems a bit unusual, but then i started thinking about it and everywhere around the world the most popular tourist attactions are often religious. Like the churches in Paris, or St.Paul's in London, or the Vatican, or Ankor Wat, or the Temples in thailand, or national mosques. So what's so bad about making a religious tourist attraction? I'm trying to think of other religious icons that have been created with tourism in mind, but i can't. Tell me if you think of any!

Maybe the Hong Kong Buddha is just the free market entrepeneurial Buddha. But is it any less 'sacred' as a spiritual icon? When i've visited there's always alot of people worshipping and doing buddhist things around, so it seems to serve both purposes quite well without pretending not to.

Anyway, unless i'm forgetting some really obvious example, i think many Christians would get angry if the church made something with a non-religous purpose. Maybe they should, and see what happens.