I’d like to put my two cents in here and DrDeth, this is partly a response to some of the things you’ve said in this thread.
I worked in the hotel industry here in Tulsa for several years. For a while, I worked as a room service waiter and after that, I did night audit and front desk work (at a different hotel). Every summer, Kenneth Hagin, a local televangelist, has a conference in Tulsa called CampMeeting that Christians (one can safely assume) come from all over the world to attend. Ask anyone in the Tulsa hotel industry about them and you’ll hear all sorts of horror stories. Actually, as DrDeth might point out, asking them specifically about CampMeeting attendees might seem like you were leading them to say derogatory things. Better yet, ask them to tell you, just off the top of their heads, about the rudest customer or group of customers they’ve dealt with. I’m sure you’d hear stories about various non-CampMeeting assholes, but I would be willing to bet that you’d hear a disproportionately large number of stories about CampMeeting attendees. To be fair, I’m sure there are plenty of attendees who would never dream of belittling an employee or otherwise behaving in a “non-Christian” way toward hotel or restaurant employees, but they aren’t the ones that stick in your mind. I know, you’re thinking, “Well, you’re just remembering the ones who were nasty, not the majority who were nice.” That’s true, but I’m also saying that even when you compare CampMeeting assholes to regular assholes, the ones at CampMeeting were worse. They never tipped room service waiters. When I was in room service, several of our employees reported being verbally abused when they told these people that room service was not included in the package price they paid for the conference and that, yes, they would actually have to pay for that steak if they wanted it. When I was working front desk at another hotel, one of our best front desk agents, a girl who could usually deal well with the nastiest of customers (and would often have them smiling and apologizing before they walked away from the front desk) was actually reduced to tears. By a minister’s wife.
My best friend worked at the local Macaroni Grill for years. He told me that although Sunday had the busiest lunch shift, it was also the worst lunch shift in terms of tips. That’s a pretty big coincidence to be just a coincidence. He said when large church groups would come in after church, the servers would all pray (ironic, huh?) for the groups not to be put in their sections because that was almost a guarantee that they’d receive shitty tips. Sometimes they’d spend an hour and a half or two hours serving a lingering group of ten or more only to receive no tip at all. Were there other people on other days who didn’t tip or tip well? Sure. Were there church groups and church goers who did? Absolutely. But there was a very strong correlation between the church goers and lousy tips. So strong in fact, that even the more devout members of the staff would do everything they could to avoid these people, having learned to accept the correlation in spite of their faith.
Again, I’m not saying that all Christians behave this way, nor am I suggesting that plenty of non-Christians don’t. I’m not a bigot who makes blanket statements about people of a particular group, DrDeth. I despise people who make assumptions about someone based on their ethnicity, gender, religion, etc. But it’s not bigoted to say that there are correlations between certain groups of people and certain behaviors. And when you attend a Christian conference, wear Christian slogans on clothing, have a WWJD bumper sticker or some such thing on your car (or carry and display any WWJD merchandise), you assume responsibility for being an ambassador and representative of your faith. Whether or not you intend to.
Furthermore, are these Bibles means purely for study difficult to open in that “new book” way? Because the people I’m talking about…, well, it’s not always the case, but you get my drift.