Community | July 13, 2011 | 24 comments

Austrian man allowed to wear pasta strainer as religious headgear

An Austrian atheist has won the right to use a photo of him wearing a pasta strainer  on his driving-licence claiming it is a "religious headgear".

Niko Alm first applied for the licence three years ago after reading that headgear was allowed in official pictures only for confessional reasons. He has now finally won the right to have a pasta strainer on his head.

Mr Alm said the sieve was a requirement of his religion, pastafarianism.

The Austrian authorities naturally thought that Mr Alm was crazy and told him to obtain a doctor's certificate that proved that he was "psychologically fit" to drive.

You may think the pasta headgear is a bit bonkers but Mr Alm came up with the plan three years ago as a way of making a serious, if ironic, point about religion and its influence on society.

A self-confessed atheist, Mr Alm says he belongs to the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster, a light-hearted faith whose members call themselves pastafarians (not a joke people).

The group's website states that "the only dogma allowed in the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster is the rejection of dogma".

In response to pressure for American schools to teach creationism, as an alternative to normal biology, the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster wrote to the Kansas School Board asking for the pastafarian version of how we all came to be on this earth to be taught to their schoolchildren, as an alternative to the Christian theory.

The next step, Mr Alm told the Austrian news agency APA, is to apply to the Austrian authorities for pastafarianism to become an officially recognised faith.

I am a bit hungry after writing that up, are you?

Source: BBC

  1. groups:
    Community,   News and Politics,   WTF
  2. tags:
    Funny,  Religion,  Freedom of Speech,  Creationism
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