Cereal maker apologizes for CD-ROM Bibles

Cereal maker apologizes for CD-ROM Bibles

General Mills has apologized in advance for including the Bible on CD-ROMs in cereal boxes headed to grocery stores. The Bible is included on the CD-ROMs along with games such as Clue, Lego Creator and Carmen Sandiego Word Detective.

The Minneapolis-based company said the Bible ended up on the CD-ROM “without our knowledge or consent,” the Associated Press reported.

“Inclusion of this material does not conform to our policy, and we apologize for this lapse,” General Mills said.

Greg Swann of Rhinosoft Interactive of Wisconsin, the company that helped create the CD-ROMs, called General Mills’ assertion that it was unaware of the software Bibles “a flat-out lie.”

Swann said his idea was to promote the Bible as part of a basic “reference library” for home computers, including a one-volume encyclopedia, a thesaurus and a Merriam Webster dictionary.

Zondervan Publishing House, a Christian publisher based in Grand Rapids, Mich., had given free licenses for the 12 million to 13 million software copies of its New International Version of the Bible.

In March, an executive from Disney Interactive, who licensed “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire” software for the CD-ROMs including the “Millionaire” software. Those CD-ROMs appear in some cereal boxes. (RNS)