In the soap opera Eastenders, a character called Alex was a protestant priest. The writers depicted Alex’s character as someone being committed to his job, a workaholic and out of touch with the modern world. Alex also had a friend called Sarah, a young teenage Christian who acted like Alex in terms of faith. She was very committed, enthusiastic, willing and always trying to share her views with relatives, friends and neighbours. Alex’s character changed dramatically when he had a sexual relationship with a married woman. This threw him off track, but as a result, made him more in touch with modern society.
An example of programmes which do not depict religious people as being out of touch is The Vicar of Dibley and Father Ted. These two programmes come under the genre of comedy, and to give them humour, the writers bring the person out of the Priest character. This is necessary in order to achieve the type of response required by the writers.
Film writers are also accused of stereotyping religious people. In the film ‘Priest’, the writers depicted a couple of Catholic Priests, one of whom was trying to become more knowledgeable about everyday happenings in Society. This resulted in him breaking the Law of Celibacy by having a homosexual relationship with a man he met at a night-club frequented by gay persons. This event did give him more knowledge about the issues faced by ordinary people in society, as the outcome of his deed meant that he lost his post. His dignity suffered as a result of the local newspaper reporting the story. The priest may also have been considered as being out of touch in the film because when a young girl told him the story of her father committing incest at confession, he resisted the temptation to intervene through informing the mother, thus protecting the girl but breaking the seal of the confessional.
A similar event occurred in the police drama series ‘A Touch of Frost’, in which a Priest broke the seal and informed the police about a murderer confessing his guilt, and therefore helping to catch the person concerned. This priest therefore put society’s concerns before his obligation to maintain confidentiality in confession.
Many people would say that ‘religious people’ do not have any fun or go out to enjoy themselves. I would disagree with this statement because not everybody has the same definition of fun. To a priest, fun may be his work or a work-related topic if that is what he enjoys. The priest in the film ‘Priest’ went out and enjoyed himself at a gay nightclub, and as a result, almost lost everything because of his actions. I think that priests and some religious people are better suited to a different lifestyle to the rest of us.
From all the evidence in my essay, I feel that I can justify concluding that the title statement is false. It is more about individual perspective about religion in the media.
By Adam Taylor
