The nation’s largest association of atheists and agnostics has started a campaign to convince the hotel and motel industry to offer “Bible-free” rooms.
In a statement, the Freedom From Religion Foundation said it asked the hospitality industry to be more hospitable to non-Christian and nonreligious clientele by offering “Bible-free” rooms.
In a letter to the American Hotel and Motel Association, the FFRF said Gideons International is “exploiting hotels and motels to proselytize a captive audience.”
“Those who must read the Bible every day will surely take precautions to travel with their own copies,” wrote Co-Presidents Dan Barker and Annie Laurie Gaylor on behalf of FFRF’s 23,000 nonreligious members. “The rest of us deserve a break from mindless evangelizing when we are on vacation.
“Many of your guests are freethinkers—atheists, agnostics, skeptics or ‘nones’—who are deeply offended to be charged high fees only to be proselytized in the privacy of their own bedrooms.”
As an alternative, Barker and Gaylor said they would prefer placement of Charles Darwin’s On the Origin of Species in hotel and motel rooms.
Gideons International, which is known worldwide for placing Bibles in motels and hotels, hadn’t responded as of Thursday afternoon to the FFRF’s statement.
Gideons recently surpassed the 2 billion mark in distributing Bibles and New Testaments.
“It is more than just a number,” International President Dr. William E.G. Thomas said. “We are placing Bibles because they save souls. Behind every number is a face, behind every face a story, behind every story a priceless soul that could live throughout eternity.”
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