Last updated 7/2008
Q: Who are you?
A: My name is Bobby Henderson. I’m 27. I grew up in Oregon and move around a lot. I have a physics degree and have successfully avoided a “real” job for years.
Q: Did you really send the Open Letter to the Kansas School Board?
A: Yes. But, I received no replies until after I posted the website online and the School Board started getting lots of emails about it. You can read some of the responses I received here.
Q: Are you an atheist / heathen / what?
A: I don’t have a problem with religion. What I have a problem with is religion posing as science. Teach Creationism in school, fine, but don’t teach it in a science classroom. And don’t change the definition of science so that you can teach these things. That’s retarded.
Supernatural explanations are by definition not science, so why would you teach them in a science classroom?
Religion, itself, isn’t bad. But it isn’t necessarily good, either. There are plenty of good Christians (and Muslims, and Buddhists, and Hindus), and plenty of bad ones.
Dogma is bad for everyone.
Q: You are making God angry.
A: I doubt it. If there’s a God, and he’s intelligent, then I would guess he has a sense of humor. And how do you know He is NOT a Flying Spaghetti Monster?
Q: Do you make money off this?
A: Yes. The Church makes money off T-shirts, car emblems, book sales, and occasionally donations. We are saving a lot of money and pretty soon here we’ll buy our first Pirate Ship which will serve as a floating church, open to all Believers.
Q: Your graph is messed up.
A: No, it’s not. The X-axis doesn’t have to represent time. And the data points don’t need to be in order. A graph is just a collection of data points, I can display them however I want. It might not be what you’re used to, but it’s not messed up. Please stop writing me emails about it (well over 200 at this point).
Q: There are more pirates now than ever. Look at the South Pacific. And song-downloading pirates, and blah blah blah.
A: Real pirates use swords (cutlasses, actually). Those “pirates” in the south pacific are guys with machine guns, cruising around in power-boats. They’re not pirates. And the song-downloading “pirates” are smelly nerds, and therefore not real pirates.
Q: Your grammar/spelling/etc is bad.
A: Yah.
Q: You’re wrong. It’s actually a linguini / mashed potato / dinosaur / elephant / whatever monster.
A: Maybe He just disguises Himself as those things. Also, you’re not funny.
Q: Can I reprint your letter?
A: Yes. Send me a link, please.
Q: Acceptible use of content?
A: It’s ok with me if you’re using the FSM images/content as long as it’s not for profit, and you’re doing it to further the Cause of the church. I.e. printing out FSM propaganda materials and distributing them is ok (and encouraged). Making FSM t-shirts, selling FSM merchandise, etc. is NOT OK.
Q: What blogging/cms software are you using?
A: The recently redesigned site is built on the Wordpress platform with the K2 template.
Q: How many members are there?
A: I don’t know. There are no membership records as such, so I can only guess based on the amount of traffic the site receives, etc. Traffic to date (September 2006) is somewhere in the vicinity of 350 million hits, and around 15 million unique visitors. Google returns close to 2 million results for the phrase “flying spaghetti monster“. So, who knows – your guess is as good as mine.
Q: Why Pirates?
A: We believe that humans evolved from pirates. Consider that humans share around 95% DNA with monkeys, and more than 99.9% DNA with pirates.
Q: Interview requests
A: I’m happy to answer your questions. I recommend you just send me your questions in an email with a subject that I’ll notice, like “INTERVIEW QUESTIONS”. You don’t need to ask permission or set up an interview for some future time, just send me the questions. Thanks.
Q: Website statistics
A: Somewhere around 10k-40k visitors per day, and somewhere around 500k-1million hits a day. Hits are extremely high because lots of people hotlink images,etc from the site. Which is fine w/me.
Emails – depends, but 50 per day is not uncommon. I have 13,839 unread emails right now (9/25/06). I’ll get to as many as I can.
Q: Why is there an FSM banner on my MySpace profile?
A: It’s a virus/worm that WAS NOT CREATED BY ME. I had nothing to do with it. I’m sorry – it caused everyone a lot of problems, and I do not approve of this sort of thing. You can remove it by following the directions here.
More questions? Ask me below, or email me at bobby.henderson@gmail.com
totally need a membership, dude. this is awesome. though a substitute for capitolism might be nice too :P
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Hooray for Bobby, for understanding and respecting His Noodly-ness.
RAmen!
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Pasta Fazool to you all!
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Dear Bobby,
The old continent salutes you.
We have been struggling with religious zealots for centuries.
Now we are fighting not only Intelligent Design supporters from getting key positions in the EU parliament in Brussels but also “newcomers” on the market such as the Scientology “church”.
Your initiative is highly appreciated by many believers, agnostics and atheists alike in Europe who reject dogmas.
I agree with our FSM Brother ‘Krip’: let’s create memberships!
Love and RAmen
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I LOVE THIS SITE!! I am a Pastafarian. Thank you for spreading the good news. And those people who send you hate mail because they actually think there is a real church need to read your CAUSE section and your FAQs.
I have been touched.
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If you ever want to read a reader’s feedback :) , I rate this article for 4/5. Detailed info, but I have to go to that damn google to find the missed bits. Thanks, anyway!
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Hidden due to low comment rating. Click here to see.
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OMG!… er, i mean OMFSM!!!, how did i survived this years without the almighty guidance of the FSM?!. Today my boyfriend told me about His church and i’m so ashamed i didn’t knew about this before!.
I’ve been truly touched!
PS: I agree about the membership :D
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:)
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@ Geary #807
You are mistaken, nothing can be “proved” in science, we simply make the best guesses that we can based on the available evidence. A good scientist must admit that they have spent their entire lives on an incorrect theory if that is what the evidence says. At the moment, there is considerable evidence that supports the theory of “macroevolution” as you choose to call it, such as fossils, DNA sequences, and the presence of vestigial limbs in living species. There is, however, no scientific evidence for intelligent design, because intelligent design is not a scientifically testable theory. However, if God (or the FSM) were to appear tomorrow, declare that he made the world and point out the evidence that he did so, every respectable scientist would have to acknowledge the new evidence. The simple fact is that has not happened (yet).
Ramen,
Sarah
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I am a believer….I have emailed brother Bobby regarding my FSM sighting this morning…hopefully he will share my photographic evidence with you all and place it on the sightings page.
Love and RAmen,
Your Pastafarian sister,
Evelyn
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Not too sure about the membership thing. Rules tend to follow closely on its heals and then people start living by rules – commandments if you will – and forgetting why they showed up in the first place. After rules come committees to make sure the rules are followed by the members and thus you’re a step further away again from why you showed up in the first place. And remember also, a pirate is ever only really loyal to his captain and his ship – neither of which should be metaphorical – and that’s the way it should be.
Lastly, I’m following enough bloody rules as it is.
RAmen
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I’m in bro, I’m in! Do I get to wear an eyepatch, matey?
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Forum has been out of action for over 24 hours. HELP!
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How does one become an ordained FSM minister? I live on Maui and weddings is a big business out here. I am quite sure that no one currently offers an FSM ceremony. I would also be interested in doing Bar Mitzvahs, vow renewals, confirmations, baptisms, etc. Thanks for your guidance.
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Arrrrgghhh y’all,
I’d be genuinely interested in converting from atheism to Pastafarianism (stripper factory + unlimited beer, HUGE selling points) HOWEVER, I’m currently having several issues with this. If any of you can resolve them I’d gladly go ahead with the big move, so without further ado here they are:
1. How come the prophet gets to avoid a real job and I don’t?
(that’s just not fair, sorry)
2. Why can’t I sell images of his holy noodlage if I so desire?
(not that I do, but even Christianity can beat Pastafarianism at this game since I wouldn’t require any kind of permission from the church to manufacture crucifixes and that’s just mega-uncool)
3. I’m concerned lest this turns into a Scientology type of thing.
(the L.Ron Hubbard argument has been outlined in one of the earlier comments so I won’t repeat it here)
4. Last but not least, some inconsistencies must be resolved if I am to join, such as the inability to trust scientific instruments to collect data…
(maybe it’s time for the second gospel? hint hint)
I really hope these concerns can be addressed in a satisfactory manner, though now that I look at them, it seems a remote possibility as it would require pretty radical changes to Pastafarianims as we know it.
Notwithstanding, comments would be most welcome.
RAmen
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AAAAAARRRRRGGG!!!!
I desperately want to join the church and society but there is no way to register on the forums. Also the forums do not have a ‘Contact Us’ that I could find. I tried clicking on “The Team” and the links for “The Power Struggle” but you must be logged in to use them or contact them in that way. I know the forums are not technically part of this site but I was hoping, for all His Noodly Appendages, that you might be able to get me in contact with them.
Also is there a recommended way to search for local chapters? And if there are none near me, how can I get one started in order to spread his sauciness to my neighbors and friends?
Thanks me Mateys!
In his Noodley Name, RAmen
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Hey, I am kind of confused about this whole thing, I am just wondering is this seriously a religion? Do you believe in a flying spaghetti monster? Or are you only doing this to mock other religions/get your point across?
Thanks for any response =)
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Check out Pastafarians on Second Life! A quick and easy way to “join” a group.
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@ – schwrz – #816,
I’ll try to answer your questions as best as I can, but I have to start with a couple of child rearing premises. Parents must teach their children at least these two truths in order to have not failed: 1) Dads must teach their children, “THE WORLD ISN’T FAIR!” 2) Moms must teach their children, “WHEN SOMEONE SAYS, ‘TRUST ME’, DON’T!”
With those premises we can begin. 1) The world isn’t fair. Get used to it. If you didn’t learn that early in life, your parents should be questioned as to why. 2) For a church that has no annual membership dues (pledges, donations, etc.) Bobby needs some source of income to operate. Faith alone is insufficient, as any televangelist will readily tell you. 3) The loose canon of this church allows a great deal of latitude for members to self define much of their belief system, as long as it conforms to the eight “I’d Really Rather You Didn’ts”. The only other piece of sacred dogma is our opposition to the inclusion of theology of any kind in public schools science curricula. At this point, remember Mom’s lesson from above. 4) In undergraduate school you are never told of the perversity of even the best scientific instruments, but in your first graduate research lab you are invariably given a crash course in Murphy’s Law. By the end of the course, you have fully absorbed the nature of the perversity of inanimate objects.
There can be no further additions to the sacred canon, since as in all religions, when it is closed, IT IS CLOSED. However, there is an extensive responsa literature on this site, and questions of all kinds are addressed here.
Although we have a prophet at the head of our church, we have no other formal hierarchy, and the site is kept honest by the Pastafarians who write the responsa.
RAmen
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Just so ya know, qmalvadore is my brain’s name, not mine, and is a silent “Q” I really think that FSMism is the only religion that really makes sense, and also is hilarious. At school, i’ve already converted many classmates by saying Do u believe in the Flying Spaghetti Monster? It has Pirates.”
¡very funny! •)
( { PS awesomest emoticon ever!! — Qmalvadore
•)
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the flying spagetti monster has changed my life…. for the better! it is (as many people have said) the only religion that has ever made sense to me. I used to be a catholic, but then my sister told me about this religion and i thought it was interesting and i bought the gospel of his noodly apendage.
i am glad that you took the time to respond to those questions as i have wondered on some of them myself.
i have ut 1 more qu..
how exactly do you officially become a pastafarian? or is believing enough to become one?
thanks people for answers.
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@ – PirateQueenAnna – #822,
Welcome aboard, Anna. Consider yourself an official Pastafarian. Try to live by the principles of the Eight “I’d Really Rather You Didn’ts”. Enjoy life and pasta with your chosen libation.
May the sauce be with you.
RAmen
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have you ever been accused of being a bit cheesy? don’t forget the meatballs either.
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Hi there, bobby, this site is fun to explore, but man, i cant think that people will believe in this crap about a religion! Ha Ha Ha!
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The guy is very long winded above me and somewhat self-righteous, so if you no the answer to THIS question maybe you can skip the above and post your answer here.
I need some pastafarian scripture to quote it seems to be the latest thing amongst all the other religions that want to damn you to hell for not agreeing with them. I saw some reference to:
Scripture of Lasanghulu
Does anybody know where this may exist? You can make it up if you want I’m pretty sure that is what most of the other religions did… a long long time ago (makes it more believe-able?). Or some just still from other older religions “one true god” as above I think is mostly old testament stuff.
BTW to the guy above there is a reason our (yes our) religions are called faiths and belief… We have to accept them in our own eyes and without knowing “proven absolute truth”.
“The gravest error a thinking person can make is to believe that one particular version of history is absolute fact. History is recorded by a series of observers, none of whom is impartial. The facts are distorted by sheer passage of time” Brian Herbert (maybe with some help from his dad)
Don’t forget to let me know where I can quote some good FSM scripture!
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To His Holiness Bobby Henderson
This is great! I’d heard about Pastafarianism for years and always wanted to check it out. Glad I finally got around to it.
Also, let me apologize on behalf of my fellow christians who have been leaving hateful and frankly stupid comments on this page. I’d like to take a moment to let all readers know that we’re not all crazy or retarded, and that SOME of us didn’t lose our sense of humor in the baptism jacuzzi thing.
The point is that regardless of your intentions or opinions (both of which you are completely entitled to), Pastafarianism has become a fun creative outlet for millions of people, and there is NOTHING wrong with having a good time.
Also, I’m no prophet, but I feel comfortable saying that God does not hate you or anyone else, and that your beliefs on whether or not He can be offended so easily are right on.
You have made a believer out of me, sir. I’m sure God doesn’t mind making room in my heart for His Immense Meatastic Orgasmicness the Flying Spaghetti Monster.
RAMEN, and tomato-basil blessings to you all.
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Wow… I can’t believe I’ve made it this far through life without being aware of the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster! I am now at more peace than I have ever been before. Thank FSM for this website!
I did have a little comment to Ben who posted on Sep 8th. I have to admit I only got through a few paragraphs of his message… it was a bit wordy and far too ignorant for my tastes. However, I wanted to respond to what I saw as his (flawed) central argument…
“just as in logic, if A is true, then anything not A cannot be true. this automatically disproves your “religion.”
Wow. Just like that his whole post became irrelevant. You see, let’s say that “A” is “the color yellow is in the rainbow.” According to him, then, in his infinite logic and wisdome, the statement “Not the color yellow (uh, so orange, red, green, etc) is in the rainbow” could not be true because it is “not A”. Or if he means “anything that is not A”, then the following argument would fit: “cats say meow” being A would mean that “cats are mammals” couldn’t be true because “mammal” something that is “not A” (A=meow in this one).
Or if you said “Billy is correct,” then according to ben, “not-Billy (maybe Paul, or Steve?)” could by his logic not be correct. Really, just replace the “A” (a variable) in his sentence with any statement, in both places, and find how many ways you can prove him wrong.
Brilliant, man… trying to use logic as the basis of your argument, but using a very basic flaw of logic… I love it!
Long live the Pastafarians and their happy, funloving and delicious way of life!
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@826
PUll your head out of your ass, you self-righteous, ignorant fool.
“The Bible has more ACCURATELY translated manuscripts than any other piece of written art on the planet. the old testament, of coarse in its different styles, has been proven authenticated and accurate. the pentateuch, or the first five books of the Bible, have been proven true by the dead sea scrolls. there ancient scrolls are direct copies from the hand written work of Moses himself, giving proof of his account to creation, great flood, and levitical law (given to him by God.)”
Firstly, The Gospel of the Flying Spaghetti Monster was written in English, therefore, doesn’t HAVE to be translated, and is FAR more accurate than any of your stupid manuscripts could possibly be.
Secondly, I can’t trust nor take seriously anyone who doesn’t use proper spelling, punctuation, and grammar. There is quite a difference between “course” and “coarse.” And something can’t be “proven authenticated,” dumbass. “Authenticated” is a verb. Go back to fucking high school. Oh, and while you’re at it, learn how to properly form complex statements, and capitalize the words at the beginning of the sentence. The word “God” isn’t the only one that needs to have the Shift key pressed; otherwise, it’d be called the God key.
And, I’m terribly sorry to tell you this, but haven’t you thought that maybe the Bible was written by men with political agendas? Haven’t you ever wondered why there are different translations, and different books in some of them? Perhaps the Catholic Church was trying to manipulate your mind, and the things you thought, so they could rule mercilessly, completely undisputed. And honestly, nowadays, if anyone – ANYONE – came up to you and said, “God told me to write this. He spoke to me last night,” you’d laugh your giant, sanctimonious ass off. True, maybe the Bible was *inspired* by God, but honestly, do you ever really have a great memory of the dreams you had the night before?
It’s amazing how easily an argument like yours can be broken down, because of all the fallacies Religion poses, isn’t it? I didn’t even HAVE to analyze the rest of your long-winded speech. Religion is merely a tool that ignorant people hold onto so they can hope that maybe there is something bigger and better out there. Hon, I hate to break it to you, but there’s nothing out there that isn’t a complex-carbohydrate. Now, be a good boy, Ben, and go play in traffic.
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” Because I said so.”
Also, as far as spell check goes, since all this is being done on a computer, not on papyrus with a goose quill pen, I would take more seriously the arguments of someone who could write the language he grew up speaking with a little more clarity and correctness. IE, LEARN HOW TO SPELL AND USE THE CORRECT WORDS IN A SENTENCE! THERE ARE THINGS CALLED HOMONYMS AND ANTONYMS, YOU KNOW!
So, as far as I’m concerned,
FUCK OFF AND DON’T COME BACK UNTIL YOU CAN SPEAK (AND WRITE ) THE LANGUAGE!
Arguing with people like that is like battling wits with an infant…..
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IM TOTALLY IN LOVE WITH YOUR WEBSITE AND YOU. IM GAY BY THE WAYS LISTEN TO BENNY hESTLER
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The Flying Spaghetti Monster reminds me each day to lead a better life. There will always be those who refuse His existence, but His influence is felt nevertheless.
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Believe it or not, i found out about this site from my english teacher in school. Dude keep up the good work. I@m pretty much an agnostic, soooooooo yeah. i suppose i’ll call myself a pastafarian from now on, (for no apparent reason? :L) This rocks….! ha
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I am an anti-godite.
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hi :)
my friend found out about FSM and quickly became a Pastafarian,
then he continually talked about it, and a few more people converted, as i tried to resist Him. but 2 nights ago, i converted to Pastafarianism :)!
I really think that this makes so much more sense than Christianity, (I was baptised at 6months old and brought up learning about God, so it’s understandable that i cannot suddenly backstab God’s existence as i have believed in God for 15, and in 6 months, it’ll be 16 years)
I do however like the idea of FSM, like i said. I only have 1 problem with the whole Pastafarianism. Heaven. I am a girl, as you can tell, and i think that it is unfair that the Heaven has a Beer Volcano and Stripper Factory, where is all the Heaven for females :( ? I doubt that anyother girl will want to be considered a stripper, that’s kinda sexist is it not? can more please be added to the Heaven? I know that it kinda sounds like being Politically Correct but i hope that this is an understandable statement :/ ?
please take it into consideration,
Gail, aged 15.
Pastafarian in Scotland =]
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Dear 826
You refer to the Bible as “written art” in your post. Thank you for your unintended intellectual honesty. Indeed, the Bible is a powerful, beautiful, terribly misinterpreted, and horribly abused piece of “written art.”
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And that being said, if people promote the teaching of Creationism, and then also promote Catholosism, would you say they have an agenda that goes beyond education as well? Like, for instance, brainwashing and world domination?
“Until Darwinian Evolutionists drop their dogmatic agenda, the Creationists/ID proponents can’t be expected to drop their justified concern.”
That’s nice. Why don’t you go tell that to the Darwinists instead of the Pastaferians?
Peace out and R’Amen!
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@ 826 – ben -,
It seems from your rant that you cannot even read the Bible. If you cannot read it you haven’t a clue about what it says. A (mis) translation can never be used for literary criticism.
When you can read it, we can have an intelligent discussion about what it really says. Until then, you’ve been sucking-up too much pap from the pulpit.
The first word has been mistranslated by the scribes in 1611. It gets worse from there. Let’s start there when you have learned the language, grammar, politics, economics, and geography of when it was written.
RAmen
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@ ben (#826)
-
OK, as you requested, I label you a religious Christian bigot. Thank you for revealing the “absolute truth,” as if we have never heard this spiel before. Your self-righteous piety is the turnoff that is moving much of the world to secularism. As a missionary, I rate you PP (Piss Poor)
-
ATSAP REVOL
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@ 826 -ben-,
The attached talk tells us how our needs as helpless infants uses the same parts of the brain as our thoughts about the mythology of religion:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1iMmvu9eMrg
The fears and terrors of the unknown are powerful drivers in our need for superstition.
RAmen
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More jumping on ben (826)!
You say “This Word of God has been proven as absolute truth”. Oh, really!!
Like how? That the world is flat, the “Great Flood” was 40 days, eh, make that 150, that rabbits chew their cud, that there was light before there was the sun, or that we are obliged to kill those of other religions?
Here’s an exercise that will take you the rest of your life, Ben:
1) prove God exists
2) prove the BuyBull is the word of God
3) prove God wasn’t yanking your chain
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@836
There are strippers for everyone no matter what their sex or gender. Going to heaven doesn’t mean you become a stripper. However, the faithful who totally love to take their clothes off have that option.
Peace,
The Danimal
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Can pastafarians eat pasta?
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