Anti-God Starbucks cup has customer steaming

Woman says: 'I don't think there needs to be
religious dialogue on it. I just want coffee'

Posted: May 06, 2007

An Ohio woman is steaming after reading an anti-God message published on the side of a Starbucks coffee cup.

The message that got Michelle Incanno's blood boiling reads:

"Why in moments of crisis do we ask God for strength and help? As cognitive beings, why would we ask something that may well be a figment of our imaginations for guidance? Why not search inside ourselves for the power to overcome? After all, we are strong enough to cause most of the catastrophes we need to endure."

The quote was written by Bill Schell, a Starbucks customer from London, Ontario, Canada, and was included as part of an effort by the Seattle-based coffee giant to collect different viewpoints and spur discussion.

"As someone who loves God, I was so offended by that," Michelle Incanno, a married mother of three who is Catholic, told the Dayton Daily News. "I don't think there needs to be religious dialogue on it. I just want coffee."

Incanno of Springboro, Ohio, admits she had been a huge fan of Starbucks before discovering the message, always ordering a large, house-brewed coffee with nonfat milk and two Splenda.

"I wouldn't feel right going back," she said.

The paper says Incanno wasn't satisfied with a company disclaimer saying the quote is the author's opinion, not necessarily that of Starbucks, which invites customers to respond on its website.

Starbucks spokeswoman Sanja Gould said the collection of thoughts and opinions is a "way to promote open, respectful conversation among a wide variety of individuals. "

This is not the first time a message on a Starbucks cup has caused controversy.

As WND reported in September 2009,  officials at Baylor University told the Starbucks store on its Waco, Texas, campus to remove a cup said to promote homosexuality. 

The offending cup featured the words of homosexual novelist Armistead Maupin.
It read:

"My only regret about being gay is that I repressed it for so long. I surrendered my youth to the people I feared when I could have been out there loving someone. Don't make that mistake yourself. Life's too damn short."

Baylor University, the world's largest Baptist school, refused to comment on the issue, said KCEN-TV in central Texas. Employees at the campus Starbucks said none of their customers had complained about the cup, but they removed it nonetheless.

http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=55564


NOTE:  Armistead would like to thank the folks at World Net Daily for keeping his quote in circulation, so that as many people as possible may take it to heart.