Though mildly irreverent in its portrayal of Roman Catholicism and Christianity in general, I have found the now decade-old British television program Father Ted to be an insightful critique both of Christianity and of human nature in general.

The premise for the program is that three Roman Catholic Priests, each with their own significant personal failings, are banished to remote Craggy Island by the Bishop where it is thought that they won’t be able to do any damage to the faithful beyond the few quirky folks who live there. One of my favorite clips involves Father Ted, the schemer who was sent to Craggy Island for mismanagement of parochial funds, trying to rescue Father Dougal McGuire, who was banished for being incompetent, from an exploding milk truck. 

Video Clip of Father Ted's Rescue

Relying solely on the Means of Grace to affect the actual, practical world in which we live looks ludicrous. And yet our job as pastors, indeed the whole priesthood of the baptized is to point people beyond the seeming disconnect between what is “real” and what is “spiritual,” to a God who is anything but irrelevant and disconnected from this world which He redeemed.

I am sure it is not unique to ministry in an urban context, but often it seems that so much of what I do in my “job as a pastor” doesn’t fit into the Means of Grace context. It deals more with the practical – housing, education, immigration, crime, community service. And yet without attention paid to these things the Means of Grace, though not devoid of its power, would appear hollow and vacuous to those who seem to need something more than “just a mass.” But on the other hand mere service without the Means of Grace neuters the power of God who has broken into history, and continues to break into history to serve his people.

The balance is one that is often hard to strike. It is easy to critique the extremes as absurd, but the middle way is neither obvious nor easy.