Sunday, March 8, 2009

Oh, Thee of Little Faith

Outside of the episode "Groped by an Angel", the subject of religion and faith was rarely, if ever, addressed. Secondarily, a Christmas tree could be seen in the garage on a couple occasions, such as in "Camp Fear."

Daria declares that she is an agnostic and we know that the Morgendorffers certainly do not attend any regular services. Now it's your turn to have fun with wild speculation on what you think/consider/imagine/hallucinate the religious preferences of different characters to be.

8 comments:

The Angst Guy said...

Despite speculation that the Morgendorffers are Jewish, they have a Christmas tree and are seen in a church during a wedding (in the intro of every episode), so I'd say they are some relatively liberal flavor of Protestant. If the last name is assumed to give Jake's side of the family a German origin, then Lutheran. If not, Methodist or whatever.

The Angst Guy said...

Oh, and the Lanes are a mixture of New Age (any sort, probably different for each person), atheism, agnostic, or whatever sounds most unusual.

Anonymous said...

For what it's worth, I will personally vouch for the possibility of a pretty areligious, if not strictly ANTI-religious, family still celebrating Christmas, complete with tree and trimmings.

Technically, I think I might be third generation vaguely heathen. We're an odd bunch. :)

Anonymous said...

I wonder how the show would have been like if Jake were an Orthodox Jew. (This could be rather interesting actually, especially if we're in a universe where Darius exists). (Especially when it's time for Darius' you-know-what).

E. A. Smith said...

If the Morgendorffers are Christian, they're Christmas-and-Easter Christians. Considering that plenty of secular people have church weddings, and everybody and their brother celebrates Christmas in the U.S., I wouldn't consider either of those to be evidence of any kind of religious belief -- even a watered-down, liberal kind -- on the part of the Morgendorffers.

Considering that secular is the default religious preference of Hollywood characters (unless there is some plot-necessary reason for them to have a faith of some sort, which is often to make them out as some kind of nutcase), I would be surprised if the question of religious orientation ever even entered the minds of the writers.

The Angst Guy said...

It occurred to me that several female students wear crosses or ankhs (the later implying either New Age or Christian belongings). It is a bit disturbing that the kid known as Slutty Girl (from "This Year's Model") wears a cross on her necklace. Andrea wears a large cross, rather prominently, and Scarlett and a blonde teen in Quinn's classes wears ankhs.

E. A. Smith said...

Plenty of rappers and other celebrities wear crosses, so for a lot of teens it's a fashion statement, not a religious one.

Anonymous said...

I think the Morgendorffers are Lutherans. However, the Barksdales are probably staunch Southern Baptists or Southern Methodists.

The Lanes are fairly secular. I imagine that Amanda's more New Age with twinges of paganism scattered about, but Vincent tends to take on the religion of whatever indigenous people he's photographing at the time. Penny probably decided to practice Santeria just to piss off her parents.

I think the rest of the cast falls squarely into assorted Christian denominations. I suppose an argument could be made for Andrea as a Wiccan, but I think it's so expected and stereotypical that she couldn't possibly be.

Oh, and Upchuck pings as Jewish to me.