SpongeBob SquarePants

John Howard was often teased about his appearance as a young child.

By Melanie Sheridan

Last time, Pop Goes The Religion looked at the World Changers Church, a denomination tailored to the unique pecuniary needs of our esteemed hip hop congregation. This issue, being dedicated to the rock and to the roll, we bow down at the alter of a new church that has been offering spiritual guidance to an increasing flock of rock's most faithful.

No, gentle readers, we're not talking about anything as predictable or, frankly, as ridiculous as Scientology or Kabalism. We're talking about The Church of SpongeBob SquarePants. For those poor souls who've been lost in the meaningless void of a SpongeBobless universe, Master SquarePants (sainthood patent pending) is a halo-yellow kitchen Sponge who lives under the sea with his disciples: a plump starfish called Patrick and a meowing sea snail called Gary, amongst others.

SpongeBob's appeal is so extraordinary that, in early 2004, his followers officially registered a church in his name, to teach the SpongeBob spiritual way. Members from New York and California to Texas have taken the conversion sacrament, before undertaking intense study of the SpongeBob Scriptures – collected in the Old Nickelodeon™ Testament known as The Hillenburg Bible, after its primary redactor. The church's manifesto is to promote "simple things like having fun and using your imagination".

But a certain type of person has proved to be particularly attracted to SpongeBob: the rock musician or fan. MTV has repeatedly paid homage to Him, and worshippers include Noel Gallagher, Kelly Osbourne, Lisa Simpson, The Flaming Lips – who have written a hymn called SpongeBob & Patrick Confront the Psychic Wall of Energy – and Avril Lavigne, a young woman not shy of shouting out SpongeBob's name in rapturous devotion. The Violent Femmes too, have been heard singing the popular SpongeBob gospel, which runs: "Who lives in a pineapple under the sea? SpongeBob SquarePants! Absorbent and yellow and porous is he. SpongeBob SquarePants!"

Theological scholars have recently uncovered a document that might explain SpongeBob's appeal to this cultural group. The New Testament, The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie, tells how SpongeBob used the transformative, life-giving power of rock ‘n' roll to deliver the citizens of Bikini Bottom from a life of servitude. It is powerful, rousing material.

Unfortunately, like all holy folk, SpongeBob's path is beset by unbelievers. Recently, conservative Christian groups have targeted SpongeBob in their Homosexual Inquisition. Although SpongeBob's sexuality has been questioned before, their objections relate to a new music video, starring His Absorbancy, which was created to promote a "tolerance pledge" to schoolchildren, in line with the Church's ecumenical stance of not "hating or excluding a certain type of person."

"Their inclusion of the reference to 'sexual identity' within their 'tolerance pledge' ... crosses a moral line," a statement from one of the Christian groups said. And in what may be a sign of the dominant religion's power, www.churchofspongebob.org has recently been subject to the digital age's equivalent of book burning, forcing followers underground.

The Christian faith's intolerance – of SpongeBob, as well as generally – is just one of the reasons why many are now converting to the infectiously optimistic and innocent Sponge. So if you've lost faith with mainstream religion and are ready, eddy, eddy for something different, why not join the chorus: “Who lives in a pineapple under the sea? SpongeBob SquarePants!”