Dear non-biblical readers: What book would YOU use to take your oath of office?

Well, it DID change my life.

An interesting conversation nearly broke out yesterday at a familiar "closed group" discussion site on Facebook. Someone asked if there were other atheists in the group, and the ensuing remarks were surprisingly civil until later in the evening, when an older white male felt compelled to write "get the hell out of my city."

YOUR city? My dear man, it's HIS city -- and you'll never forget it again once the Anchor Chip is implanted into your brain.

My demographic cohort continues to regularly embarrass me with such attitudes, which isn't surprising given how few of them were ever properly toilet trained, but I digress.

My contribution was this comment.

Speaking personally, I’m a non-proselytizing atheist. There’s nothing to talk about absent a belief system, so it seems pointless. At the same time, I see benefits to a separation of church and state, because that’s the best condition for all religious beliefs to survive — or none. I’ll talk about THAT, but it’s not as fruitful to discuss a negation.

I returned this morning to affix the following article to the angry white male's eviction notice; alas, the moderator had removed the post.

Consequently, let's view it here (emphasis mine).

Sen. Kyrsten Sinema Took Her Oath of Office on a Lawbook, Not the Bible, by Hemant Mehta (Friendly Atheist/Patheos)

When Democrat Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona was sworn into the U.S. Senate today, she placed her left hand on an Arizona “lawbook” (to use Getty’s terminology) instead of the Bible. It’s precisely what you’d expect from the only officially “Unaffiliated” member of the new Congress.

I imagine Vice President Mike Pence, who administered the oath, died a little on the inside.

To be sure, Sinema isn’t an open atheist, and there were a lot of books other than the Bible this year for newly elected members of Congress. But it’s still nice to see a government official show people that her allegiance is to our country and our laws, not a holy book or the Ten Commandments. Sinema did the same thing in 2013 when she was first sworn into Congress ...

Tennessee selects destructive book, gun as state symbols.

Welcome to my new series, Batshit Crazy Expeditions Through America. Let's visit Tennessee, and the book that inspired the Inquisition and a thousand pogroms.

Bill to make Bible Tennessee's official book heads to governor, by Joel Ebert (The Tennessean)

Tennessee is poised to make history as the first state in the nation to recognize the Holy Bible as its official book.

After nearly 30 minutes of debate, the state Senate on Monday approved the measure, sponsored by Sen. Steve Southerland, R-Morristown, with a 19-8 vote, sending the legislation to Gov. Bill Haslam’s desk.

Then, a veritable cannon.

Tennessee’s new official state rifle is so powerful it can ‘destroy commercial aircraft’, by Christopher Ingraham (Washington Post)

The Barrett .50 caliber rifle is a powerful gun. Widely used in the military, its rounds can "penetrate light armor, down helicopters, destroy commercial aircraft, and blast through rail cars," according to a report from the Violence Policy Center, a gun safety group. The Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence describes .50 caliber rifles like the Barrett as "among the most destructive weapons legally available to civilians in the United States."

And as of Wednesday, the Barrett .50 caliber is now the official state rifle of Tennessee, joining an illustrious roster of other state symbols including the raccoon (state wild animal), the tomato (state fruit), and Tennessee cave salamander (state amphibian).

Finally, lest we Hoosiers stoop to smugness, remember that Mike Pence is our governor, Ron Grooms shines the guv's ideological shoes, and we have our own official state firearm.

Replica of Grouseland Rifle, the official state gun, commissioned for bicentennial, by Tim Evans (Indy Star)

Indiana is among six states where lawmakers have designated an official state gun.

In the other five, it is a type of gun — the Colt 45 in Arizona, for instance, or the Browning M1911 automatic pistol in Utah.

In Indiana, however, it is an individual firearm. Just one gun: The Grouseland Rifle.

At least the Grouseland Rifle can't be used to shoot planes from the sky.

Cape Breton Island sounds better and better with each passing day.

Biblical truth may be YOUR truth, but it isn't mine. Discuss.

Boy, did they discuss. I posted the following at Facebook, and we were off to the races.

Biblical truth may be YOUR truth, but it isn't mine. That's what the Constitution's all about, and why fundamentalists correctly sense that the gay marriage debate is about far more than just that one, specific issue. What it's really about is a nation drawing ever closer to dispensing with the fiction that the law for all is somehow "dependent" on one religion's holy book.