New Jersey McDonald's Allegedly Bans Homeless Bible Study from Meeting Inside Restaurant

A New Jersey woman is looking for a new place to conduct her Bible study for the homeless and drug addicts after she says the McDonald's where she has held the meeting for the past two years told her she can no longer use it.

"She was really nice about it," 33-year-old Dawn Martinez told the Christian Post about the manager at the Camden, NJ, restaurant who approached her last week, "but she says, 'I know that you have been giving Bible studies for a long time but we've had a complaint.' She didn't tell me what happened, but she said there was a complaint and that we cannot have our Bible studies there anymore."

When Martinez asked for more of an explanation, she was told that the group was offending people of other faiths.

"She said, 'Well you are a Christian and there's other people of other faiths and so people are getting offended.' She said, 'I'm really sorry, but that's just the way it is.' I had to cancel the Bible study."

As for those who were offended, Martinez has a theory: She believes that there were Muslims present at the most recent meeting and overheard a lesson she was giving on the origins of the faith.

"It was a very powerful night. We had one woman join our prayer circle at the table and she was weeping and crying, but that was nothing unusual for our meetings," Martinez told the Post. "I gave the Bible study. We talked about Isaac and Ishmael. I began to give the history on the descendants of Ishmael and the differences between the Christian and the Muslim faiths because the Muslim faith believes the descendants of Ishmael are the chosen people."

"It was real brief and nothing unusual happened," she added. "We had the Bible study. We prayed and we left."

But the next time the group showed up to meet,the manger pulled Martinez aside and delivered the news.

"I believe that's the only explanation that makes sense to me right now," Martinez said of her theory. "It could have been the praying, but I've been there two years and I've never changed anything. I really don't know any other reason."

Martinez is planning on showing up to McDonald's on Monday to get more of an explanation from McDonald's, and the Christian Post refrained from contacting the restaurant as Martinez looks to resolve the matter privately. And through this all, her resolve has not faded.

"I'm not really sure what's going to happen when they [the Bible study members] stop seeing me there and how to get the word out because they are not like us. They do not have phones. They just know to go to McDonald's because Dawn is going to be there," she explain. "I do know that I want to step up my evangelism, but I do not want to abandon them either. I'm going to be praying about it. I am going to show up on Monday and Wednesday even if I have to meet outside McDonald's and we have to take it to the park or something, but I am not going to let them down."

Read the full story at the Christian Post.