A Christianity-based sitcom

I agree that he doesn't have to have non-Christians, but the question he asked was how to appeal to non-Christians. The easiest way I could think of was to include non-Christians. I mean, part of not demonizing Christianity in media is to have them get along with other faiths/nonfaiths, right?

Not that I'm really paying attention, but I'd probably prefer no mention to a token mention, myself.

Hmm, you're probably right. I didn't look at it that way.

Meh, I prefer tokens meself. As long as they are characters in their own right, at least.

But that's getting off topic.

As long as they are characters in their own right,

Which is exactly what fails to happen. The majorities are in the story as people, while the minorities are in the story as minorities.

That would be bad writing, not necessarily tokenism.

Don't be hatin' on Hank Hill. XD

Who.

The main character of King Of The Hill. I think he's referring to this post.

Personally, I prefer Touched by an Angel. An entire series of very special episodes, and it worked. Anyway, a Christianity-based sitcom could work, but it might be difficult to make it appeal to the masses. I actually think that potentially offending Atheists shouldn't be the most of your worries (most non-idiotic Atheists realize they're a minority and are pretty indifferent to religious messages in media), save for troll Atheists and "let's make fun of Christians behind their backs" Atheists who will almost certainly end up making nasty remarks and youtube poops out of your show. In your position, my biggest worry would be about appealing to a wide enough array of Christian ideology, as the show would likely end up offending conservative/liberal Christians depending on which direction you take it.

Edit: It dperesses me that Touched by an Angel has no Crowning Moments. There's at least one CMOH per episode!

edited 10th Nov '10 1:50:15 PM by randomtropeloser

I liked T Ba A.

Yeah, this would be more toward the conservative side. XD Youtube poops THAT'D BE AWESOME!

@ Mr AHR, who said: "Or jewish, islamic, hindu or buddhist. The only religion I don't think we have is hindu."

I'm a born-again agnostic, so forgive me for intruding on a thread that may not be intended for me, but some observations.

Hindus in comedy: the character of Raj Kooprathali in The Big Bang Theory is often used as a sounding-board to explain elements of Hinduism to a largely non-familiar audience, and comedy is derived from the way others respond to him - ie, Mary Cooper's attempts to evangelize him to Christianity and get him out of a Satanic delusion, or Sheldon's well-meaning attempts to explain aspects of his own culture to him, or else Howard making snarky references to what everybody knows about Hinduism - the beef taboo and sacred cows.

Apu in The Simpsons gets this too - the Rev. Lovejoy looking at a statue of Ganesh and reflecting that "you people were a long way down the queue when the good Gods were being handed out".

The classic portrayal of Hinduism in comedy has to be British/Asian sketch show Goodness Gracious Me, in which a British/Asian cast look at the experience of being Indian/Pakistani in Britain. The sketches also send up Islam, Sikhism and Buddhism; but aspects of the religions which even natives find absurd are used to amuse (and educate White Brits). There's a sketch about an Indian family living in suburban Britain who adopt a sacred cow and come up against a few little, er, problems about practicing their religion...

As for specifically Christian archetypes in comedy, Father Ted is good - surreal, yes, but rooted in the structures and idiosyncrasies of the Roman Catholic Church in Ireland. There is a kernel of recognisable fact here - the reason why so many Irish people love and adore the show and RTE has it on permanent loop. (Also, look to Irish comic Dave Allen for a far more savage TV take on the Church)

For more realistic portrayals, you might want to look back in British TV comedy about religion. A show that (arguably) provided the ground for Father Ted and the framework for it to flourish ran in the 1980's and was Bless Me Father. This was also about roman Catholic priests sharing a house: but the scenarios were more everyday-real and were based on the everyday reality of priestcraft and religion. They were based on Author Avatar short stories written by a parish priest about his pastoral life as a young just-out-of-seminary curate, assigned to the care of a much older, wilier, cunning, senior priest. Father Duddleswell can be viewed as a wilier and far more honest version of Ted Crilly.

You also have long-running and whimsical drama-comedy series Ballykissangel about a young English priest assigned to a rural beat in Ireland (a British/Irish co-production). Indeed, one Father Ted episode is a deliberate parody of Bally K.

Going back still further, 1960's and 1970's BBC sitcoms called oh Brother, All Gas and gaiters, et c, starred loveable klutz Derek Nimmo first as a novice priest and then a parish priest in the Church of England - again affectionate rather than barbed or satirical, and as I recall ones which like "Bless Me Father" ultimately emphasised the gentler and more positive aspects of Christianity and that it was, in the mian, a Good Thing despite its quirks and occassional pomposities.

A Christian sitcom sounds awesome. I remember my days in a youth group and had a blast. Lots of sitcom worthy events. Especially if your characters are catholic like myself so they can smoke and drink (assuming college age, disregard that last sentence if in high or junior high school).

For a Very Special Episode, Sheldon's teacher in youth ministry comes by, and turns out to be a Broken Pedestal; Sheldon has to show his character growth by revealing the truth even though it might injure the reputation of the church.

Excuse me for being slightly off topic, but I wanted to recommend a Christian-themed graphic novel about a group of freshmen entering college together, including the protagonist who ends up rooming with a "bad" girl. It would be a really good reference for well-written Christian fiction, but for the life of me I cant remember what it is called. Ring a bell with anyone?

Dear god I replied to this thread 4 years ago how did time pass.

Speaking of Very Special Episodes, one where Luke is shown to have deep psychological scars, but the gang (and HIM) cares about him anyways.