In the Netherlands, Dirk Jan Dijkstra applied for a Dutch passport around 2015 using a colander on his identity photo, which was rejected by the municipality of Emmen, after which Dijkstra successfully registered the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster as a church association ("kerkgenootschap") at the – initially hesitant – Dutch Chamber of Commerce in January 2016. However, the municipality continued rejecting his application, arguing that registering as a church association did not mean that Pastafarianism was now a (recognised) religion, leading Dijkstra to sue the municipality for discrimination, and gathering dozens of colander-wearing FSM Church members and sympathisers at the trial in Groningen on 7 July 2016. Meanwhile, other Pastafarians succeeded in obtaining colander-featuring passports and driver's licences from the municipalities of Leiden and The Hague. On 1 August 2016, the Groningen court ruled that, although Pastafarianism is a life stance, it is not a religion, nor is there a duty in Pastafarianism to wear the colander, and therefore the religious exemption to the prohibition on wearing headgear in identity photos did not apply to Pastafarians. In January 2017, Nijmegen Pastafarian and law student Mienke de Wilde petitioned the Arnhem court to be allowed to wear a colander in her driver's licence photo. She lost the petition, both at first instance in February 2017 and on appeal at the Council of State in August 2018.