Shawn McGowan
REL 120 Scriptures
11 December 2014
Modern Day Prophet A modern day prophet is someone who is an effective leader or spokesperson for a group/cause while promoting a prophetic message. I believe Bobby Henderson can be considered a modern day prophet because he leads a group of people promoting his own prophetic message. In a letter the Kansas State Board of Education Henderson reveals his newly acclaimed thoughts about Intellectual design. Bobby Henderson can be considered a modern day prophet, promoting his newly revived religion, Pastafarianism or the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster. In 2005 Bobby Henderson wrote a letter to the Kansas State Board of Education protesting their decision to permit teaching intellectual design as an alternative to evolution in public school science classes. Henderson satires creationism by ranting in his letter about a supernatural creator who closely resembles spaghetti and meatballs that “changes results of carbon dating with his Noodly Appendage”. Henderson prophesies that intelligent design uses ambiguous references to a creator; therefore any conceivable entity could fulfill that role. After receiving no reply from the board of education he posted his letter virally gaining significant public interest. As Henderson’s letter grew in popularity, the satirical nature of his argument caught global attention and received many supporters. According to Pastafarian beliefs, pirates are the original Pastafarians, and are divine beings. The inclusion of pirates was first found in Henderson’s letter to the Education Board, where he uses this as an effort to illustrate that correlation does not imply causation. Henderson correlates global warming, earthquakes, hurricanes and all other natural disasters to the dying numbers of pirates. Instead, Pastafarians believe that they were "peace-loving explorers and spreaders of good will" who distributed candy to small children, adding that modern pirates are in no way similar to "the fun-loving buccaneers from history". In addition, Pastafarians believe that ghost pirates are responsible for all of the mysteriously lost ships and planes of the Bermuda Triangle. Pastafarians now celebrate International Talk like a Pirate Day on September 19. Pastafarians also celebrate every Friday as a holy day, and conclude all prayers with a R’amen/rAmen referring to instant noodles and their parotic deity. Bobby Henderson’s logic behind this satirical religion is actually quite possible. He states that just as many Christians do not take the bible literally, many Pastafarians do not believe in the existence of the Flying Spaghetti Monster. People get something out of religion despite their lack of literal belief such as peace, a sense of community, and an easier way to understand the world. With Pastafarianism, literal belief is less important; belief is not required for religion, because they have no irrational Dogma that requires faith. The argument whether or not the Flying Spaghetti Monster actually exists is beside the point because it can not be proved either way, just as Christians can not prove the existence of their physical god. Pastafarianism is as valid as any other religion or belief-system. Pastafarians also reject dogma; therefore have no problems with radical fundamentalism. Technically the theory of Pastafarianism is just as probable as Christianity, although its fundamentals are ludicrous, it can not be physically proven wrong. Henderson can be slightly compared to the situation of the profit Nathan in the book of Samuel. Nathan announces to David that he is the prophet of God and reprimands David for his act of adultery with Bathsheba while she was the wife of Uriah the Hittite. Henderson explains to the Kansas Board of Education what he describes as a wrongful act to let schools teach Intellectual design to students. He explains to them that if Intellectual design can be taught in school, why students can’t also be taught about Flying Spaghetti Monster creationism as well. In conclusion, a prophet is someone who can be an effective leader, or someone that leads a group or cause to promote a prophetic message. Bobby Henderson can be considered a modern day prophet because of his commitment to his self made religion Pastafarianism. Pastafarianism, also known as “the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster”, Pastafarianism was a parody of religion created in 2005 by Bobby Henderson in protest at the decision by the Kansas State Board of Education to require the teaching of intelligent design as an alternative to evolution in the state's public schools.