WASHINGTON (AFP).- The devout Christian family that upended a part of President Barack Obama's health care law aims to open a Bible museum in Washington in 2017, a spokesperson for the project said Friday.

The Green family, owners of the Hobby Lobby chain of arts and crafts stores, is contributing its vast private collection of rare biblical texts and artifacts to the museum planned a few blocks from the Capitol and the National Mall.

Hobby Lobby made headlines in June when the Supreme Court ruled it could refuse to include birth control coverage in its employee health plans on religious grounds.

The ruling was seen by some as a victory for religious freedoms in the United States -- as well as a blow to a controversial section of Obama's health care reforms.

"The yet-to-be-named museum is scheduled to open in 2017" in the one-time Washington Design Center in the heart of the US capital, the spokesperson for the project told AFP by email.

The project was first announced in January 2012 in a press release from the non-profit Museum of the Bible organization that did not specify an opening date.

The "non-sectarian, scholarly-focused international museum" is to tell how the Bible came to be, its global impact, and the story that is told "in this best-selling book of all time."

The Green family, based in Oklahoma, has acquired more than 40,000 items for its private biblical collection, some which have been included in traveling exhibitions around the world.


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