‘Father Ted’ poked fun at Catholic Ireland; a faithful audience appreciated it | Hacker News Reader

‘Father Ted’ poked fun at Catholic Ireland; a faithful audience appreciated it

americamagazine.org

38 pointsmellosouls17 comments

It's not just a piss take of catholism , it's a piss take of Irish country life and a very affectionate one. I grew up in Belfast, spent a lot of time visiting relatives on farms in Donegal. That recurring cup of tea joke pretty much happened nearly every weekend to me as a child "do you want another cup a tea"..."no thanks"..."awk sure go on!" This was long before the show aired.

> it's a piss take of Irish country life and a very affectionate one. I grew up in Belfast, spent a lot of time visiting relatives on farms in Donegal.

The cup of tea thing isn't a rural Irish phenomenon. It's a widespread thing that would happen in pretty much every house in every (at least ROI) Irish rural/village/town/city.

British too. I've probably drunk more tea out of politeness than I actually wanted.

Father Ted is as mentioned by the article (and the Irish Catholic source it links), something that really could only have been made when it was, in the middle of collapse of the Catholic church as an influential establishment in Ireland. 15 years earlier it would have been criticised for making light of church authority and condemned for it. 15 years later, and we'd be right in the midst of revelations about priests abusing kids and the church covering it up and nuns running industrial schools that neglected children to the point of death. The author recognises this in a tweet that's quoted but no longer available as his Twitter was banned due to a crusade of trans harrassment.

It’s funny, it was just the other day I was trying to convince my other half to watch Father Ted. She thought it’d be like that dreadful Mrs Browns Boys.

Ahhh I loved this show. Sadly they chose not to make more because the guy who played Father Ted tragically died of a heart attack after the first series.

Father Jack makes me piss. I love the episode where they’re trying to teach him how to say phrases like “that would be an ecumenical matter” instead of his usual “Drink, arse, feck, girls”, ready for a visit by a group of Bishops. They ultimately succeed and one bishop is very interested in what Jack has to say after he successfully responds with “that would be an ecumenical matter”.

Or, in response to “what you say to a cup (of tea)?”, he shouts “feck off cup!”

Hilarious. I’m not Irish but I was brought up Catholic so maybe that’s what makes it so funny.

Dermot Morgan died just after making the third series. Before Ted, he was best known for Scrap Saturday, a radio show that parodied and mocked the Irish politicians of the day.

Scrap Saturday was arguably a watershed in Irish culture. It was broadcast on the national broadcaster (RTE) that even today is criticised for being too close to the government. By making fun of powerful figures, it opened peoples eyes to how ridiculous and corrupt Irish politics could be.

Ironically, Fr. Ted was commissioned and broadcast on Channel 4 on UK TV. At the time, the talk was about how RTE refused to commission the series because they didn't want to mock the Church, although this has been refuted by the writers.

Over the course of two series, Dermot Morgan mocked both the political and religious establishment and brought both closer to the common person. Whether this reflected the changes that were happening in modern Ireland, or lead the way can be debated. But we're certainly poorer for his loss.

Oh wow. I’m not sure where I got first series from. I must have binged in one continuous session!

Thanks for the history on a show I remember fondly from my youth. I love that :)

They're short series, and with very few arcs, there's not much to differentiate between series. And it's easy to binge watch the entire box series!

My favourite part of my job is naming internal tools and applications after characters and quotes... it helps that the owner of the company is a huge Ted fan.

They weren't planning to make any more even when Dermot Morgan died - though I suppose they might have changed their mind.

Great Father Ted doc at

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nsIxJZ8u0H0

I always find this bit moving:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nsIxJZ8u0H0&t=6m24s

> “Father Ted,” in some ways, is a warning against the “integralist” state, against the suffocating, politicized omnipresence of a religion that ultimately must rest on individual faith.

Funny, as Graham Linehan is banned from Twitter because of intolerant trans activists (my opinion).

Unrelated, one funny aspect of Father Ted is how the priests don't get any special treatment or respect from the island inhabitants.

Linehan did not get banned for just generally opposing trans rights but for repeated harassment targeted at individuals (specifically instances of accusing trans people of grooming kids)

I grew up looking at this - brilliantly funny.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=MMiKyfd6hA0

‘…where are you going, with your fetlocks blowing…’ :) https://youtu.be/Nxf6ECuRcWM

Excellent tv show. They still do Ted-fest on Craggy island where people come together (Covid probably made it skip 2 years now) to celebrate it.

  >They still do Ted-fest on Craggy island...

Craggy Island is fictional. Ted-Fest[0] takes place on Inis Mór [1], the largest of the Aran Islands. Which is also where the shipwreck featured in the Father Ted title sequence is to be found.

[0] http://tedfest.org/

[1] https://www.aranislands.ie/

The wreck is actually on Inis Oírr, the smallest island.

Over the past few years it's kind of collapsed in on itself. It's not much more than a vaguely boat-shaped pile of rust these days.

My correction stands corrected

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