Atheist Hymn?

There are other good, sometimes more serious, atheist hymns, too. I think my favorite (perhaps technically more feminist-pagan than atheistic per se) for sing-alongs is probably "Heretic Heart" (to FOREST GREEN, alt.), text by Catherine Madsen:

HERETIC HEART

I am a bold and a pagan soul
Come rambling thru this land
I judge the world by my own rights,
And I come by my own hand.
And if you asked me how I've learned
To live so joyously:
My skin, my bones, my heretic heart
Are my authority.

My mother lives her life in fear
My father's an angry man
But I have sung at the ancient rites
And danced on holy land.
I sing the seed out of the ground
And the bird down from the tree
My skin, my bones, my heretic heart
Are my authority.

I once was found but now I'm gone
Out of the faithful fold
Of those who think that holiness
Is to do as you are told
Though man and scripture, priest and law
have all instructed me,
My skin, my bones, my heretic heart
Are my authority.

They tell me Jesus loves me;
I fear he must love in vain.
For what can any Man-god know
Of woman's secret pain?
My healer is the lady moon
Whose tides run deep in me;
My skin, my bones, my heretic heart
Are my authority.

So while I breathe this glorious air
An outlaw I'll remain
My body may not be subdued;
My soul shall not be saved.
And where I may not shout out loud
I'll sing it secretly --
My skin, my bones, my heretic heart
Are my authority.

Haruo

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