May 1, 2003 - ATLANTIC CITY, N.J.--If you stay at the new Borgata Hotel Casino and Spa, it will be strictly BYOB: Bring your own Bible. 

It will be the first time in America that lodgers in a casino hotel won't be able to reach into the nightstand and pull out a Gideon Bible. 

"The decision was made, and has been made for some time," said Michael Facenda, director of marketing for Atlantic City's Borgata, which is scheduled to open this summer. 

"What about the Koran, the Greek Bible, the Old Testament, New Testament, Jehovah's Witness?" he asked. "We opted, instead of excluding everyone, to include everyone." 

Bill Walters, manager of human resources at Nashville-based Gideons International, had very little to say about the Borgata snub. 

"We have no comment about that," he said tersely yesterday. When asked whether any other motels or hotels have made a similar move to ban its Bibles, Walters said: "No comment to that, as well." 

Since January, the $1.05 billion Borgata -- which means village in Italian -- has marketed itself as a trade up from other casinos. On billboards along the Atlantic City Expressway, it teases potential employees with the slogans, "Work Someplace Different" and "Are You Ready?" 

Facenda said the no-Bible position fit the Borgata's strategy of breaking tradition as Atlantic City's first new casino in 13 years. 

"We've had very rare instances over the years where there were any expressions of wide interest in any one specific [religious] text," Facenda said. "It's been a very low number. People often bring their own documents with them." 

Never before has a casino announced it was doing away with Bibles in hotel rooms, said Adam Fine, editor in chief of Las Vegas-based Casino Player magazine. 

"The fact that they're not putting Bibles sends a very clear statement -- that at the Borgata, anything goes," Fine said. "It's sex and fun, gambling and glitz, and who needs a Bible?" 

Facenda, however, said: "The Borgata is not trying to be the first, but trying to do the right thing and... not exclude anyone." 

Gideons International, founded in 1899, says it has distributed more than 59 million Bibles in more than 70 languages in 177 countries. 

The group's mission statement reads: "Our sole purpose is to win men, women, boys and girls to a saving knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ through association, personal testimony, and distributing the Bible in the human traffic lanes and streams of everyday life." 

For the fiscal year that ended May 31, Gideons International reported more than $98 million in income, of which $86.1 million was directly used for the purchase and placement of Scriptures. 

Bible placement is focused on hotels and motels, overnight health-care facilities, schools, prisons, and military and public-safety personnel. 

In Atlantic City's 25-year history of casino gambling, "it's never been an issue," said Jim Werner, Scriptures secretary for the Gideons Atlantic County chapter. 

"We hope they come around," added Werner, who has an office in Brigantine. 

If gamblers feel a need for inspiration, they won't come up completely empty-handed. 

Facenda said numerous religious texts would be available upon request at the Borgata's living room in the lobby area. 

"That's our angle and what we've chosen to do," he said. "We will have a very diverse crowd at the Borgata." 

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(c) 2003, The Philadelphia Inquirer. Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News.