Northern Lights Cathedral Church as the main church for the deanery. The "Northern Lights" are the Aurora Borealis associated with the Arctic night sky. At the opening service, bishop Per Oskar Kjølaas admitted that the word was contentious since it technically meant not a parish church but a cathedral (for which the more common Norwegian word is ). He defended the name by the informal precedents of the and , and argued that a bishop is at home in all churches of the diocese. Northern Lights Cathedral The Northern Lights Cathedral - Alta Church () is a parish church of the Church of
Comet Hale–Bopp sight. It shone brighter than any star in the sky except Sirius, and its dust tail stretched 40–45 degrees across the sky. The comet was visible well before the sky got fully dark each night, and while many great comets are very close to the Sun as they pass perihelion, comet Hale–Bopp was visible all night to northern hemisphere observers. After its perihelion passage, the comet moved into the southern celestial hemisphere. The comet was much less impressive to southern hemisphere observers than it had been in the northern hemisphere, but southerners were able to see the comet gradually fade