Two stories from a rotting Western nation

Here's what happens when a society is afraid to call itself explicitly Christian.

Don't try to find a Gideon's Bible in the top drawer of your nightstand in a British Travelodge motel:

The decision by one of Britain’s largest hotel chains to remove Bibles from its rooms has sparked complaints from Christians.

Travelodge, which operates 500 hotels, says the Bibles were removed for “diversity reasons,” citing the country’s increasing multicultural influences, the Daily Mail reported. The chain reportedly said that despite the recent uproar, the decision to remove the Bibles was made in 2007.

The company said in a statement that the move was designed so as “not to discriminate against any religion.”  Now the Bibles, supplied by the Gideon Society, are available at the reception desks for guests to borrow.

According to the Daily Mail, a receptionist at a Travelodge branch in London could not find a copy of the Bible when one was recently requested, and suggested instead to use the hotel’s free Wifi to “Google it and read it online.”

The employee was forced to call his manager when pressed to find a hard copy of the Bible and was told that there were no Bibles in the hotel since a renovation done last year.

Travelodge is the first national hotel chain to remove Bibles, according to the report. In 2012, one independent hotel replaced Bibles with the best-seller, “Fifty Shades of Grey.”

The Church of England is not happy with the hotel’s policy. “[It is] both tragic and bizarre that hotels would remove the word of God for the sake of ergonomic design, economic incentive or a spurious definition of the word ‘diversity.’ ” the Church said in a statement.

I ask you, does a society where things are going this way have the resolve to prevent what UK PM David Cameron warns about? 

“The creation of an extremist caliphate in the heart of Iraq and extending into Syria is not a problem miles away from home. Nor is it a problem that should be defined by a war 10 years ago. It is our concern here and now,” he says.

“Because if we do not act to stem the onslaught of this exceptionally dangerous terrorist movement, it will only grow stronger until it can target us on the streets of Britain. We already know that it has the murderous intent.”

In his article, Mr Cameron says Britain and the West need a firm security response to the crisis in Iraq and that fighters from Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (Isil) cannot simply be removed by air strikes alone.

I wish our similarly moribund society at least had a leader who got it.