Reverend Timothy Lovejoy
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| The Simpsons character | |
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| Rev. Timothy Lovejoy | |
| Age | 41 |
|---|---|
| Gender | Male |
| Hair color | Dark Brown |
| Job | Minister of the First Church of Springfield |
| Relatives | Wife: Helen Daughter: Jessica |
| First appearance | The Telltale Head |
| Voice actor | Harry Shearer |
Reverend Timothy Lovejoy (more commonly known as Reverend Lovejoy) is a fictional character and the local minister in the long-running animated TV show The Simpsons. The character, voiced by Harry Shearer, enjoys playing with model trains. The creator of the show, Matt Groening, has indicated that Reverend Lovejoy is named after NW Lovejoy Street in Portland, Oregon, which is in turn named for Portland co-founder Asa Lovejoy (there also happens to be an English broadcaster named Tim Lovejoy). In the episode Jaws Wired Shut, it is revealed that he has received surgical pectoral implants.
Rev. Lovejoy is the Pastor of the Church (of uncertain Protestant denomination, mentioned as "The Western Branch of American Reform Presbylutheranism" in one episode) that almost everyone in Springfield dutifully attends. In one episode, Dr. Hibbert and his family (who are among the wealthiest in town) decide to attend a storefront gospel evangelical church.
The character has become far more jaded over the years. In earlier seasons, Lovejoy was more tolerant if faintly cynical, in contrast to fundamentalist Ned Flanders.
In the episode In Marge We Trust, he describes when he initially came to Springfield an eager, idealistic young man in the seventies, only to become more cynical and disillusioned about his flock and ministry, mostly due to Flanders, who constantly pesters him with such non-emergencies as coveting his own wife. Lovejoy would dispatch such concerns with maximum brevity so that he could return to playing with his model trains (his true passion).
Regarding his ministry, he once explained to Marge, "I just stopped caring. Fortunately by that time it was the eighties, and no one noticed." Lovejoy demonstrates a thorough knowledge of the Bible, citing parables such as the "foolish man who built his house on sand" in an attempt to warn Homer Simpson against the dangers of founding a self-serving "religion". Homer retorts with a random passage of his own, which Lovejoy cites immediately as having no relevance to the discussion. Homer then tries in vain to cover himself by saying, "Yeah ... think about it!"
Lovejoy is not always enthusiastic about The Bible and is often disparaging about its content and purpose. He tends to stress church and community work over any involved study of biblical text.
His tolerant side is demonstrated when he performs a marriage for Hindus (though he apparently thinks Hindus are a Christian group), co-hosts a religious radio program with Krusty the Klown's rabbi father, and admits evolution may be true. However, despite the fact that he married a Hindu couple, he is unable to identify Apu's (Hindu) religion in other episodes.
His sermons currently vary between dreary recitations of more opaque parts of the Old Testament, to the occasional "fire and brimstone" scaremongering about Hell—- and very little of the love and joy that the Reverend's surname suggests.
Bart and Homer find it particularly difficult to pay attention during church. When congregation members begin to nod off, Lovejoy can awaken them by pressing a button on his lectern resulting in prerecorded sounds, including an eagle, an ambulance siren, a disco whistle and a blimp attack. The church building is a clone of the one seen in the film The Graduate.
Despite being a clergyman, Lovejoy has been known to exploit his congregation for money, brawl with a Catholic priest, encourage his dog to foul Ned Flanders's lawn, told Moe he had little to live for, and in an aborted attempt to burn down his church for insurance money, indicates that he has committed arson before.
Over the years, Lovejoy has been increasingly intolerant. In She of Little Faith, he calls Lisa, who had converted to Buddhism, "Marge Simpson's devil-daughter". Moreover, he appears bitter about the tall Episcopal church across the street, wanting to build a larger steeple and, when mentioning the other church, placing the emphasis on "pis". He also read to Lisa an excerpt from the Bible to justify Whacking Day (during which many snakes are killed), but refused to show her the supposed text supporting his argument. While he seems to have originally believed in evolution, he later takes up the creationist cause to bolster his church's membership. He has also driven a "Book-burning-mobile", further revealing an extremist nature. He seems rather stingy as well. In one episode, it is revealed that Lovejoy checks his Bible out of the local library every Friday; when the librarian asks him whether it would be easier to simply buy a Bible, Lovejoy acidly implies that it would be difficult on his salary.
Reverend Lovejoy's rarely-seen daughter Jessica loves to pull pranks and manipulate people. In the episode Bart's Girlfriend, her hijinks are revealed to stem from her hunger for attention, which her father does not sufficiently provide. Reverend Lovejoy sent her to boarding school in an attempt to curb her tendencies, but Jessica was expelled, having shown no improvement.
Lovejoy's wife, Helen, who looks older than her husband, was originally portrayed as a moralistic gossip, but in voice actress Maggie Roswell's long absence her character was seen but not heard. Now Helen Lovejoy is rarely seen without being at her husband's side. Despite the 1950s aura, it is she, not her husband, who is the driver of the van that takes the Lovejoys out of town when Homer Simpson wins the church as a gambling debt and ends up bringing the wrath of God upon Springfield, which is allayed only by the Lovejoys' return.
