East End theologian's kind of a sponge (5)

I believe the answer is:

loofa

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'sponge' is the definition.
(I've seen this before)

'east end theologian's kind of a' is the wordplay.
'east end theologian's kind' becomes 'lo' (I can't explain this - if you can you should give a lot more credence to this answer).
'lo'+'of'+'a'='LOOFA'

Can you help me to learn more?

(Other definitions for loofa that I've seen before include "Something for the bathroom" , "bathing accessory" , "One in bath" , "back-scratcher?" , "clean-up with this" .)

I've seen this clue in The Everyman puzzle in The Observer.

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