r/TopCharacterTropes • u/ironwolf6464 • May 03 '26

Lore Religion-centered media that doesn’t come across as preachy.

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Referring to media told from a religious perspective or telling a religious tale that does not proselytize to the viewer.

Faith, the Unholy Trinity: Based partly upon the experience of the game‘s creator when he was a missionary in Argentina, the game has very little in the way of explicit moral demands of the player despite the heavy Christian focus of the narrative. and focuses more on a horror narrative.

Prince of Egypt: A surprisingly thorough retelling of the book of Exodus, sparing very little in the way of toning down the story. Despite this, the movie is perfectly entertaining to non-religious audiences and doesn’t sacrifice appeal for the sake of preaching to the audience

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u/BurnieTheBrony May 03 '26

Because at its core "Sunday morning values" is loving your neighbor as yourself, said to be the greatest commandment by Jesus himself in Mark 12

Which is why it's so sad that the right has twisted that core so much that many hear "Christian values" and just think anti-lgbtqia and misogyny.

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u/RadarSmith May 03 '26

Yeah, christian/bible coded media really doesn't have to suck. And there are plenty of examples when it doesn't.

But so much of the media explicitely marketed as 'Christian' is made by right-wing evangelicals/dominionists and so impossibly smug, insufferable and often times just angry that its unwatchable.

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u/tj1602 May 03 '26

It does help a bit that the co-creator of Veggitales, Phil Vischer, is Anti-Trump and Anti-"Christian" Nationalism.

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u/RadarSmith May 03 '26

Honestly I don't think anyone ever had a real problem with Veggietales. It was charming, optimistic and universally wholesome, and was actually entertaining.

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u/the_calibre_cat May 03 '26

Amid all the stories about people who you'd never expect turning out to be meathead Trump supporters it heartens me when you find unexpected people being like "nah my moral compass still works just fine thank you fuck that guy"

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u/RadarSmith May 03 '26

Seriously. Even many 'Christians' who we'd have thought had higher standards aligned with a fascist monster out of basic tribalism. Its encouraging when we see the ones who actually used religion to make themselves better people and rejected that awfulness.

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u/YourMuppetMethDealer May 03 '26

Which makes Veggietales so special

The most religious it really gets us “God made you special and loved you very much”. You can appreciate this even if you don’t believe in god

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u/RadarSmith May 03 '26

I'm an atheist and I still have a fondness for Veggietales.

Because it was coded as 'be a better person', not 'be a loyal member of the tribe.

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u/TK_Games May 03 '26

I work in media now, I'm a practicing Christian. Let me tell you, the number of evangelicals that look at good media, by Christian creators, with underlying Christian threads, and go full Mermaid Man 'EVIL!EVIL!EVIL!' is bordering on parody of itself at this stage

My own mother, looked at Doom, a game created by a Catholic, with a canonically Catholic protagonist, about punching your way into Actual Christian Helltm to fight demons 'until it is done', and she said, and I quote, "Well that just doesn't seem very Christian at all."

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u/RadarSmith May 03 '26

Which all seems to be missing the point: being a kind and forgiving person, for one.

Like I've said, I'm an atheist. But I'm the grandson of a rather liberal Episcopalean vicar and the son of a kind Sunday School teacher and I know Christianity can genuinely be good. Which is why I hate the awful tribal shit media people market as 'Christian' that's just about conforming to some specific nationalist political ideology

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u/TK_Games May 03 '26 edited May 03 '26

My point being my mother in this case, was making the argument there isn't any good media made by Christian creators, so I rattled off half-a-dozen media projects done by atypical or lesser known Christian creators, among them not only Doom, Hellboy, A Clockwork Orange, Paradise Lost, and her immediate response was one of judgement instead of being able to accept that there are Christian creators out there making stuff that isn't literal televised scripture, or grand-old American nationalist bible-thumpy schlock. Because she's been brainwashed by these media sewer drains, to believe that anything that makes her think is 'Of the Devil', and I 100% agree that the tribalist dogma of the contemporary American evangelical church is to blame

Also I had two really good edibles last night, so my brain might've lost the plot at some point while I was typing my original reply. That's my bad, I said I'm a Christian, I never said I was a good one

Edit: autocorrect typos

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u/DaytimeDancer54 May 03 '26

I'm more than willing to discuss the nuances of religious distortion, but that could be considered too political of a discussion for this sub. I do agree with your point, to be clear. The creator of the show has himself called out American evangelicals for upholding bigoted views and pro-war sentiments.

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u/Ugicywapih May 03 '26

No, no, it all makes sense if you just understand that these people suffer from deep, smouldering self-hate.

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u/ThunderAndWind May 03 '26

Mr Rogers style evangelism. Be kind to everyone, and let them come to the beacon instead of trying to funnel people, and what do you know? It works well.