The only exception I can recall in the past forty years was Evan, the impulsive cop on Nash Bridges. We watched him ruin his relationship with Cassidy, get shot and become a drunk, and then get into a 12-Step group and recover, giving Glory to God right out loud. Man, I was SO worried they were going to make a standard Hollywood Christian out of him, but he actually stayed faithful...up until the moment they had a madman kill him as revenge on Nash. But they didn't play him as a hypocrite or a raving loony, like they do most times. Outside of that, (and good old Ned!) what other examples does anyone have of POSITIVE Christian characters in recent media?
>>>>>”There are plenty of Christians on TV and in the movies. If I see a clerical collar or someone invoke God or Jesus in the first five minutes of a presentation...I can be sure they are going to be the bad guy, murderer, pedophile, hypocrite, lying bastard adulterer by the time the last frame rolls. This is near universal. “
Every movie that I can think of that has been made in the past few decades is like this. No matter if a character is a priest, minister, bishop etc or a Christian parent, they are cast as deranged psychos, thieves, pedophiles, etc. They give no credit to the millions of Christians who are not bible thumpers, who spend much of their lives doing charitable work helping people, who give massive amount of money to good causes and they do not brag to the world about their good deeds like the Hollywood crowd does.
On Lost, Mr. Eko’s faith was treated with respect. Of course, he was a murderous drug-runner before his conversion, but that could bring comparisons to Paul. At any rate, Eko’s brother was a devout Catholic priest with none of that baggage.
Also, we’ll have to see how it plays out, but one of the writers on Heroes (he writes for Lost as well) recently said that he is concerned that evolution was shown as the absolute truth behind the heroes during the first season, so he wants to take a serious look at Christian people who see the powers as a gift from God.
Christianity was mostly shown respect on Friday Night Lights.