The Reverend Billy, with peroxide, swept-back hair and a white tuxedo, stands before the tourists and shoppers of Times Square in New York and declares that Mickey Mouse is the Antichrist.

Under his dog collar, the Reverend wears a T-shirt with an image of the mouse, arms outstretched under a mouse-trap, Christlike, his black ears poking out.

For the last decade, the Reverend has toured the United States with his gospel choir from the Church of Stop Shopping, to urge Americans to curb their spending and recognise that the wealthiest nation of the world is dangerously addicted to the mall.

“What we are seeing is the Shopocalypse. We are all buying, we are all dying, we are being consumed,” he says.

The antics of Bill Talen, a screen-writer who became so concerned about the influence of global corporations such as Walt Disney, Starbucks and Wal-Mart and America’s obsession with shopping that he created the character of the Reverend, are now the subject of a new film by Morgan Spurlock. While Mr Talen’s character is fictional, his message is genuine.

The film, What Would Jesus Buy?, opened in the US last week, and follows the actor, who tries to use the comedic preacher to urge Americans to question why they spend and consider the true cost of their purchases.

In an interview with The Times, Mr Spurlock – whose last main film, Super Size Me, sought to highlight the impact of America’s excessive fast food diets - said: “The average American has $15,000 (£7,268) of credit card debt. It’s not uncommon to hear stories of people who have a card delivered in the mail and have it maxed-out by the end of the day.

“For many American families, they spend so much over Christmas, they spend seven months paying it off. We used to be a nation which produced things, now we import. We are consumers. A value system has developed in the US which is buy more, spend less,” he added.

Mr Spurlock’s attack on spending could be perceived as unpatriotic. The shopping mall is the bedrock of the American economy. Around 40 per cent of gross domestic product is derived from consumer spending.

After the terrorist attacks of September 2001, President Bush was so worried that Americans would stay at home, keep away from the malls and trigger a fall in consumer spending, that he told them to do their patriotic duty and go shopping.

While Americans’ obsession with shopping has helped build the US to be the wealthiest country in the world with an economy valued at $13.9 trillion, the other side of the coin is that Americans have run up a combined consumer debt bill of $2.4 trillion.

For the first time since the Great Depression, American households have a savings rate on average of zero – they spend all they earn.

From yesterday until Christmas Eve, Americans are expected to spend half a trillion dollars in shopping malls.

“How can shopping be patriotic? Increasingly, we are trying to get something for nothing on the back of sweat-shops in the Far East.,” Mr Spurlock argues.

“I think that is a very un-American thing to do. We have products made overseas where no one is controlling the environment where they are made.

“We seek satisfaction by shopping, by buying more and more things and seem to be more and more dissatisfied,” he adds.

So does the Reverend, in a 1960s-style coach emblazoned with the slogan “$ave yourself”, really think he can make a difference?

Mr Talen has become such a thorn in the side of Starbucks that the group has issued a court order banning him from entering any of their coffee shops across the US.

His wife, who also appears in the film, cannot remember how many times he has been arrested, or manhandled off the premises of a corporation.

Unsurprisingly, he is not exactly welcome in a trip to Wal-Mart’s head office in Bentonville, Arkansas, when the Reverend and his gospel choir perform a mock exorcism on the world’s biggest retailer.

Mr Talen says his task is to try to make people think, to unravel the lure of the advert. “We live within a system of product selling. The packaging always promises a Utopia.

“Advertisers think they are heaven-makers with so many references to eternal life and happiness shot through the commercials.”

Mr Spurlock, who hopes that the film will be screened on British TV before Christmas, offers a final note of gloom: “They say the UK is behind the US by about ten years, don’t they? So this addiction is coming your way.”

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