Affiliate Disclosure
If you buy through our links, we may get a commission. Read our ethics policy.

New Jersey firefighters sworn in on iPad Bible app

Last updated

Last week, several Atlantic City firefighters took their oaths of office using not a physical Bible, as is tradition, but a Bible app on Apple's iPad.

According to a Friday report from NBC 40, officials had scheduled a ceremony to promote several Atlantic City Fire Department workers to Battalion Chief and Fire Captain, but upon commencing the proceedings it was noticed that no one had thought to bring a Bible to City Council Chambers.


Atlantic City firefighters get sworn in on an iPad. | Source:NBC 40

One attendant, though, carried Apple's popular tablet computer along with him. The iPad owner pulled up ― or downloaded, as the report is not clear ― a Bible app. The firefighters then swore their oaths, each placing his hand on the iPad with the Bible app open.

Watch the Latest from AppleInsider TV

102 Comments

tomkarl 19 Years · 236 comments

OK, it's bad enough that government offices in a country that has separation of church and State swears in firefighters with a Bible, but using an electronic device as a substitute is ludicrous. I'm sure that the Pope wouldn't consider an iPad (bible app or not) as sacred as the church's Bible.

lkernan 21 Years · 7 comments

Hope they watched the screen, all those touches and they could have ended up swearing on Angry Birds

nchia 19 Years · 124 comments

Why not? You already have the "Jesus Phone".

franck 24 Years · 130 comments

Well, when the president himself has to swear on the Holy Bible...so much for the so-called separation.

dlux 17 Years · 666 comments

[quote name="Franck" url="/t/155898/new-jersey-firefighters-sworn-in-on-ipad-bible-app#post_2275108"]Well, when the president himself has to swear on the Holy Bible...so much for the so-called separation.[/quote] The president doesn't [I]have[/I] to use a Bible, but they do it out of blind tradition. I'm looking forward to elected officials who decline using the Bible and instead use a copy of the Constitution. And then see who complains...