Sermons bear such titles as "You AreNothing, If Not a Hound Dog."

Church doctrine requires that members overeat (preferably fatty foods), face Las Vegas daily and visit Graceland at least once during their lives. Men should function as masters of the house while women wear bikinis and cook.

The First Presleyterian Church of Elvis the Divine, which meets weekly on the Internet, was founded by Karl N. Edwards of Hoboken, N.J., and the Rev. Mort Farndu (real name Martin Rush) of Denver. It has its own gospel and even its own political lobbying group, which suggests putting jobless people to work building shrines to Elvis Presley.

Of course, the Presleyterians are a joke.

So is another denomination, the Church of the Risen Elvis. "It's a concept and a T-shirt," said church founder Dana Cain in a recent telephone interview.

Humor aside, people are increasingly comparing the cult of the rock 'n' roll hero to a religious movement.

A religion in the making

Some of the parallels are obvious. He's known as the King. His home is Graceland and people make pilgrimages to leave gifts at his grave. Some people decorate their homes with the equivalents of Elvis icons. A few even claim to have seen him in a resurrected form.

Ted Harrison, author of "Elvis People -- the Cult of the King," writes that the Elvis movement may be "a religion in the making, which has already gathered to itself the trappings of a faith."

"When followers of Elvis came to him and called him the King, he rebuked them, saying, 'No, don't think like this. There is only one King, and that is Jesus,' " according to Harrison, a former BBC reporter. "Since his death his fans have gone unrebuked."

Spreading the gospel

Musicologist and historian Louie Ludwig picked up on the religion theme with his book "The Gospel of Elvis," published last year. During his research, he claims, "I was always touched and occasionally haunted by the intense feelings oflonging, hope, renewal and transformation that Elvis can evoke."

In putting together the Presley story in gospel form, he used a bibliography that included a range of sources from "Nag Hammadi Library in English" to "Dead Elvis."

Recent articles about the influence of Elvis have appeared in The New York Times Magazine and Angel Times.

Maia C.M. Shamayyim, who attended 36 Presley concerts between 1969 and 1975, wrote the Angel articles. "I witnessed miracles of spirit that would be difficult to put into words, because they spoke more accurately through the verse of the heart," she wrote. "The interaction between Elvis and his audiences went far beyond entertainment, and into the realm of mystical communion."

Guiding light

Among the evidence she cites of Presley's possible mystical significance are his father's story, told to a biographer, that a blue light shown down upon the family's Tupelo, Miss., home the night the singer was born.

Most people regard such claims as about as silly as the Presleyterians.

But Dr. Raymond Moody, a psychiatrist now living in Alabama who did pioneering work in the phenomenon of near-death experiences, noticed early on that some of his patients were truly distraught over Presley's death.

"One woman told me she responded more deeply to the death of Elvis than to members of her own family," Moody said in an interview.

Moody collected such stories for his book, "Elvis After Life," published nine years ago.

His chronicles include the story of a Georgia police officer who said a spiritual form of Elvis came to him in a dream and showed him the exact house and street in Los Angeles where he could find his runaway son; a Tennessee farmer who said Presley came into his field and said goodbye shortly before his wife arrived with news of the singer's death; and a trucker who picked up a hitchhiker going to Memphis and was startled to see Presley sitting beside him.

"One of the chief pastimes of modern human beings is to watch TV and movies, and listen to the radio and records," said Moody. "What I think is probably going on [is that] at some level the unconscious is very uneasy with this. It thinks the celebrity is capable of appearing in person."

Attachments to celebrities may be more appealing than to real flesh-and-blood family and neighbors, he observed. "When it's with Elvis, it can always be wonderful."

But the death of a celebrity is unreal in the way a friend's passing is not, Moody said. "You still hear the records. You still see the movies. Your mind doesn't have any sense of the real death of that person."

Moody compares Elvis worship to the saint cults of medieval times.

But Presley had no pretenses of being a religious figure, said his stepbrother, Rick Stanley.

"I think it's kind of sad," said Stanley, who now lives in Fayette County. "Instead of being critical of a person who's deified my brother, I'd rather try to find out why they do."

Stanley, a Christian evangelist, said one woman told him that when she was an overweight teenager never invited on dates, she sat at home and listened to Elvis records.

"I began to understand that he's meeting a need in some people's lives," Stanley said. "But I don't think people need to put him in a position that only our Lord deserves."

Despite his lifestyle and his flirtations with Eastern religions, the singer was a Christian, Stanley said. He borrowed much of his style from gospel music, and hymns were among his greatest hits. He even once said he should have been a preacher.

But people will continue to look to Presley for worldly answers unless they are offered an alternative, he said.

"I think in the church, when we learn to love people that aren't like us, we probably won't see as much of the deification of rock stars and sports heroes," said Stanley.

Celebrities, even Elvis Presley, cannot fulfill human spiritual needs, said the Rev. Charles Lowery, senior pastor of Albuquerque's Hoffmantown Baptist Church.

"We want to think that Elvis is alive and enjoying that money somewhere with another beautiful woman," he wrote in SBC Life, a newsletter of the Southern Baptist Convention. "Admitting his death is to admit the world's system promises, but it can't deliver."

When you put your faith in Elvis, Lowery says, "all you get is a room at the Heartbreak Hotel."

Make a pilgrimage to the First Presleyterian Church.
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