Care/Cure of the Soul as well as the Body

Michael Hyatt, CEO of Thomas Nelson Publishers, a Christian House, decided to do his part to help Katrina victims, and he described the effort in a post on his own blog:

This morning, I started getting e-mails from our employees with ideas for how our Company could help. Everyone feels the need to do something. I know I do. You can only watch the images for so long before you feel compelled to take action.

Realizing we need to act quickly, I asked Jim Thomason, our HR Director, to form a "Disaster Relief Committee" and make a recommendation to me by the end of the day. He and his team met and then made two proposals. . . . I immediately approved both.

First, we will donate 100,000 Bibles to the relief efforts. Why Bibles? This afternoon, an official in Baton Rouge said on Fox News, "We need water, food, . . . and Bibles." This is something I knew we could help with. Samaritan's Purse, an organization headed by Franklin Graham, one of our authors, has agreed to distribute these for us. We will begin shipping them to Louisiana as soon as we get instructions from Samaritan's Purse.

Second, I have approved a matching contribution program for our employees. We will match dollar for dollar any contribution our employees make to Samaritan's Purse up to [a total of] $50,000.

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Not Everyone Wants to Care for the Soul

Here are some of the comments that readers submitted to Hyatt's blog; we're quoting them verbatim and running them together:

100,000 Bibles. That is the most asinine thing I have heard in years (and I've heard a few) You are fool of the first order. You sending bibles to people who need food, water, medicine, blankets, clothes and shelter. I shake my head in wonder and dismay.

Bibles !!!! Unbelievable...... In my eyes you are a moron! Unbelievable.... there are people DYING and babies and old people suffering indignities beyond any comprehension and you send them BIBLES - aaaaggggghhhhh - America IS nuts - no doubt about it.

If I were starving, thirsty, homeless, and in need of medicine, and someone handed me a bible, I would spit in their face. This is the most ridiculous, useless, self-serving thing I've ever heard, and anyone who gives money to this cause is going to hell.

Yeah, sure, Bibles, you f***in Moron!!! In order to support this neo-con creationist ideology that got these poor people in this situation. One of the posters here got it right, these people are about to die - shot by our own soldiers when trying to get some grocieries in order to survive! BY OUR OWN SOLDIERS, GOT IT???

There are positive comments too, but it's quite astonishing that the Bible would inspire such hatred, especially from people who supposedly don't believe in it.