Touched by his noodly appendage...

According to the website of the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster (also know as Pastafarianism) their faith has existed in secret for hundreds of years, only recently bought into the mainstream by a letter written by Bobby Henderson to the Kansas school board. In this letter Mr Henderson praised the school board for adding intelligent design (read creationism) to the science curriculum, and insisted that, if the Christians were to get their own slot in science lessons, then he should get his as well. He went on to explain exactly what it was he believed, complete with helpful diagrams. He claimed that the creator was a large sentient ball of spaghetti and meatballs who created all living things. He also went on to explain how Pastafarians reject the concept of gravity, claiming instead that the Flying Spaghetti Monster holds us on the earth using his 'noodly appendages'.

What began as a highly original political protest about the separation of church and state quickly became an internet sensation. It's popularity among sudents especially was boosted when Mr Henshall published his 'Gospel of the Church of the FSM', in which he claimed that global warming was the FSM's punishment on mankind for the lack of pirates. This lead to founding of the holy day of Pastafarianism, International Talk like a Pirate day. This holiday has quickly gained popularity, with many people celebrating it unaware that it's actually as Holy day of a Parody Religion.

The FSM is a prime example of an anti-religious Parody religion which has been embraced by the Atheist movement, though in a Q&A session on the church’s website, Bobby Henderson insists that they’re not anti-religious.

Religion, Politics and the Great Pumpkin

... are the three things Linus van der Pelt said he'd learnt never to talk about. For those of you who don’t know, Linus is a character from the Peanuts cartoon strip (starring Snoopy) by Charles M. Schultz. Fairly early on in his life, Linus creates his own religion by confusing Halloween and Christmas. He lives his life convinced that if he believes hard enough then the great Pumpkin will appear to him and bring him gifts at Halloween.

I mention this because the subject of this blog is parody religions, and when you type parody religions into wiki, you get a list which includes Linus’ worship of the great pumpkin. Personally I’m not sure it should count as Linus is the only one who ever follows it (though he believes in it with an evangelical fervour) but you can’t argue with Wiki (except that you can, and probably should).

Parody religions are definitely a phenomenon of recent times, and owe their existence largely to the Internet. If a man were to turn up at your house and tell you he worshiped a sentient ball of spaghetti, you’d think he was a loony. But for some reason, if he says it on the Internet, he becomes the founder of one of the fastest growing of the parody religions, Pastafarianism or the Church of the flying Spaghetti monster (more on them in future posts).

But what is Parody religion, I hear you cry? Parody religion as a blanket term covers two distinct phenomenon; those groups which are purely spoofs or parodies of other religions, often trying to highlight the ultimate foolishness of religion, and those groups which are in many way genuine religions, but with a slanted or skewed world view which makes them seem at first to be simply a joke. The prime example of the second type of group is the Church of the Blind Chihuahua, which at first glance seems like a joke, but once you delve deeper, you realise they are making a valid point about the way Christianity is practised. They are not tying to convert people to atheism (which it could be argued groups such as the Pastafarians are doing), they are believers, but their world view is slanted and in most cases humorous.

So why write a blog about them? Yeah those zany Pastafarians are kind of cool with their off-beat humour and their pirate costumes, but aren’t ultimately just being silly? Well in many ways, yes. But they also give rise to some interesting questions, such as why do people do this, haven’t they got better things to do and why don’t they just grow up? I intend to examine these (and many more interesting and serious questions) in the months to come.