Brendan O’Regan
Some viewers were left disappointed by the finale of Line of Duty. I can see the headline now – ‘Shock! – Catholic Teaching Found in Catholic School’.
This fanciful notion struck me listening to Liveline (RTÉ Radio One) last Thursday when the controversy of the day was Flourish, the Catholic bishops’ programme for relationships and sexuality education (RSE) in Catholic primary schools. There was a lot of complaining. One woman didn’t like religious beliefs intruding on sex education as it should only be about the science. But then she complained about the document’s position that human life began at conception – there were varied views about this she thought, reminding us of the abortion referendum. So much for following the science – some people do that only when it suits the ideology, otherwise fairy dust will do. Only one caller took an opposing view – why should you be surprised to find Catholic teaching in a Catholic school? Fair play to him, but unfortunately it was pretty much his only relevant point, and his case wasn’t helped when he described a child being raised by a same-sex couple as “child abuse”, clarifying that he meant it wasn’t right to deliberately deprive a child of a mother or father.
News bulletins on Friday showed another dubious aspect of the controversy – Tánaiste Leo Varadkar said schools must teach about same-sex relationships, while the bishops’ document was quoted as saying the complementary and gender balanced man-woman concept of marriage shouldn’t be left out. This was seen as some sort of clash…the media does thrive on conflict, whether real, imagined or contrived.
Confession
But enough of the real world! I added another confession scene to my collection from drama series Viewpoint (ITV) last week. It was a pretty intense adult thriller with a ‘Rear Window’ vibe as a surveillance team kept watch on a murder suspect. In one episode the police officers followed a person of interest and found him in a church, coming out of a confession box…so ha! He must have something to hide! One officer blessed herself and sat down respectfully, the other approached the sinner and reminded him that it doesn’t count, that it’s only words, if you don’t do restitution. So, he urged the man, who had provided a fake alibi, to come clean.
It was building up to an exciting climax, when ITV pulled the last episode – usually it’s the characters that get bumped off in these shows! Angry fans blew up the Twitter machine. The main character was played by Noel Clarke who was accused during the week of bullying and sexual harassment. According to news reports he apologised for any inadvertent offences on the first count and denied the second. For viewers that had already invested four hours in the show, they moved the final episode to the ITV Hub catchup service, which didn’t help Irish viewers as that service is not readily available here. Ironically, they replaced the show with an episode of It’ll Be Alright on the Night…it wasn’t.
If there was great anticipation building up for that series finale, it was nothing like the massive build-up for the final episode of Line of Duty (BBC One) on Sunday night. This show is unique in the way it has brought people together for unmissable live television – no binge watching here! It’s pretty much essential to watch it live, or better still on slight delay so you can rewind to catch the smallest of details that might be significant. If you wait too long you might be exposed to spoilers that will ruin the twists and turns of the convoluted plot. That last episode, while gripping as always, lacked the big punch people were expecting, and once again Twitter blew up, this time with the term ‘disappointing’ trending.
Secular
The world of the show is almost entirely secular, though last Sunday Superintendent Ted Hastings (Adrian Dunbar) worried about the judgement of God on an error of judgment he had made that had tragic though perhaps unintended consequences. His iconic phrase “Mother of God” doesn’t come across as disrespectful, and on a recent show he topped this with an expression of exasperation “Jesus, Mary and Joseph and the wee donkey”, which set the internet alight with searches for images of St Joseph to use in twitter memes. Maybe in this year of St Joseph the saint had a wry smile at the sudden renewal of interest.
Heaven knows what it might lead to.
Pick of the week
Give Up Yer Aul Sins
RTÉ One Saturday May 8, 3.15 pm
Making the Blind See: Charming animated story of the miracles of Jesus.
Sunday
BBC Radio 4 Sunday May 9, 7.10 am
Topical religious and ethical stories.
Mass
RTE One Sunday May 9, 11.00 am
Fr Patrick Cahill celebrates Mass in the RTÉ studios in Dublin with members of the Holy Family Mission, a residential evangelisation project for Catholic young people, based in Glencomeragh House, Co. Waterford. The musical director is Patrick McCamley.