Token Religious Teammate

There's this one guy or girl in the team that stands out from the other team members. They stand out because of their faith or their religious values. While many of the team members may be atheists or agnostics, or at least haven't given much thought to religion, this team member is devoted to their faith.

Regardless of whether they serve one god, or multiple gods, or some divine cosmic energy, their beliefs have defined the way they see the world and the way they respond to any given situation. This may manifest in a Thou Shalt Not Kill code, or they may be a violent, psychotic character who uses their faith to justify their actions. Whatever the case, this causes the character to stand out from the other characters due to their faith. If they are militant, expect them to be a Badass Preacher, or a Technical Pacifist.

If they are Christian, they will almost invariably be Catholic. Unless they're wacky or hypocritical, in which case they'll be Protestant.

Quite often the Token Good Teammate, although psychotic examples could qualify for Token Evil Teammate. May also be the Token Wholesome.

At their worst, a Token Religious Teammate is Stupid Good or Lawful Stupid.

Contrast with Secular Hero.

Examples of Token Religious Teammate include:

Anime and Manga

• Sister Eda of Black Lagoon. Also, Claude Weaver from the Greenback Jane arc.
• Gundam AGE has Max Hartway, a pilot for Woolf's squadron who always prays to God for strength prior to battle.
• Seikai, one of the Brave 10, left the Izumo temple to pursue his own brand of Buddhism.
• Yukariko of the My-HiME anime, as she is a nun.
• Momoko in the Ghost Stories dub.

Comic Books

• Nightcrawler from X-Men.
• Wolfsbane in New Mutants and later in X Factor.
• Transformers:
  • Drift and Cyclonus in Transformers More Than Meets the Eye are both fervent believers in Cybertronian religion. Swerve is also mentioned to be religious but it's not showcased to the same extent as the other two.
  • The planet of Caminus in Transformers Robots in Disguise among the Cybertronian colonies. While all of the colonies revere the Thirteen Primes and the Titans, the Camiens are the only ones who take this reverence to the level of full blown religion.

Film

• In Waterloo, Private Tomlinson (Oleg Vidov).
• In Cowboys and Aliens, Meacham.
• Major League has Eddie Harris, the stock hypocritical Protestant, and Pedro Cerrano, the voodoo practitioner, who are often in conflict.
  • In Major League 2, Cerrano converts to Buddhism, which puts him in conflict with new outfielder Isuro "Kamikazi" Tanaka, who mocks his shallow understanding of Buddhism.
• Holly Little from Starship Troopers: Marauder. In addition to Little, Sky Marshal Omar Anoke was also revealed to be religious but he was not worshipping the same god that Little was.
• Deacon, from Red Tails, who made a point of praying to "Black Jesus for protection for himself and his fellow pilots.
• Captain America in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. While it's not given much focus, he's a practicing Protestant and outright denies calling Thor and Loki Physical Gods because, in his words, "there's only one God".

Literature

• Relg in the Belgariad is a fanatic who observes strict religious rites, including stopping to pray several times a day, until the rest of the party force him to stop. He also has issues with sin, especially relationships with women, that he never entirely gets over even after he's married.
• Constable Visit-The-Infidel-With-Explanatory-Pamphlets is this for the Watch in Discworld.
• While in the Elenium most of the main characters are Church Knights, Bevier the Cyrinic knight is the most pious, stern and religious of the bunch, almost ending up in the Lawful Stupid ground. The other Church Knights in the group tend to have a much more pragmatic approach.
• April in Everworld.
  • Jalil is an Inversion as the only explicitly atheist (and anti-religious) member of the group. This had an interesting result when the gods of Everworld-Africa ordered the team to make a sacrifice to them, as Jalil and April actually teamed up in refusing.
• I, Robot features the experimental robot Cutie, who attempts to make sense of the world around him (really little more than a space station one mile across) by turning to religious faith.
• Robyn Mathers from Tomorrow When the War Began. She isn't the only Christian in the group, but she's the most devout, even having a Thou Shalt Not Kill code. She eventually breaks it.

Live Action TV

• Lourdes from Falling Skies.
• Zhaan from Farscape was a Delvian Pa'u or priest(ess). At one point she committed acts of violence so repugnant to her own sense of morality that she renounced her status and spent about half a season reattaining it. She was the spiritual heart of the show up until her death in early Season 3. Stark and Noranti were similarly spiritual characters.
• Shepherd Derrial Book from Firefly.
• In M*A*S*H, Father Mulcahy.
• Star Trek:
  • Downplayed for Worf on Star Trek: The Next Generation. He wasn't overtly religious but did mention Klingon lore a lot. "The Icarus Factor" even focused on his Raised by Humans status meaning he missed out on the Klingon equivalent of a bar mitzvah.
  • Major Kira on Star Trek: Deep Space Nine though the gods she's worshipping are quite firmly established to be Sufficiently Advanced Aliens.
  • Chakotay in Star Trek: Voyager. His religion though is a confusing, sometimes even contradictory, mishmash of Native American beliefs because the show's advisor on Native American beliefs was Jamake Highwater, later revealed to be a Snake Oil Salesman.
  • Downplayed for Christopher Pike in Star Trek: Discovery. He's not religious but his father was a studier of religion. As a result, Pike has a greater insight into the religious folk of other planets than the rest of the largely atheist Starfleet.
• Hershel from The Walking Dead. He seems to be the only character on the show so far with any serious religiosity.
• Shirley from Community, frequently bringing up fundamentalist beliefs. Annie is Jewish and Abed is Muslim but they don't bring it up anywhere near as much as Shirley does.
• Supergirl among the heroes of the Arrowverse. While she isn't an active practitioner, she's the only who mentions gods and other religious terminology. Though as Season 3 shows, she has standards for how extreme she'll take this and is disgusted that the teachings of Kryptonian religion have been perverted by the Cult of Rao.

Tabletop Games

• In Dungeons & Dragons, there is a general trend for the party's Cleric or Paladin to be the religious, pious member of the party.

Video Games

• William McCall from Call of Juarez: Bound in Blood. He also doubles as the Token Good Teammate.
• Leliana from Dragon Age Origins and Sebastian Vael from Dragon Age II.
• Rival Schools: of the three Pacific Highschool students, Boman is said to be a devout Christian.
• Vanilla H from Galaxy Angel is the only member of the team for whom religion is really important (superficial resemblance to Catholicism plus vegetarianism).
• Mass Effect has a few Religious Bruiser teammates, but Thane Krios from Mass Effect 2 is the most devotedly religious. He's introduced killing a Corrupt Corporate Executive and then saying a "prayer for the wicked" - meaning himself.

Web Comics

• Chirinide from Drowtales.
• Durkon from Order of the Stick. Although this is a world that has been created by gods, and the gods play a somewhat-active role in everyday lives, and many of the team members follow a religious deity, Durkon is the team's Cleric. Therefore he is the token religious teammate.
• Fletcher Emerson (AKA Pardus) is the only overtly religious member of Panthera.
• Reverend Theo Fobius in Schlock Mercenary.

Web Original

• Phase of Team Kimba, and Loophole of the Whitman Lit Chix. They even have a talk about their faith in a Loophole story, with Phase revealing that he is having a crisis of faith since he has lost everything: his family, his old friends, his wealth and power and protection, his long-held anti-mutant beliefs, his identity, and even his gender.

Western Animation

• The Simpsons
  • Referenced in "Lemons of Troy", when Bart is assigning identities to his squad. Todd Flanders is "the religious guy who goes crazy."
  • Marge Simpson. She's clearly more involved in the church than the rest of the family. And while for example "Homer The Heretic" focuses on Homer's dwindling faith, it's obvious on several occasions that none of the other family members would go to church unless Marge made them do so.
  • Lisa Simpson. "She Of Little Faith" had her convert to Buddhism and she's quite serious about it.
  • Ned Flanders whenever he gets involved in one of Homer's Zany Schemes.
• On South Park, both Kyle (Jewish) or Butters (Christian) get played this way in some episodes, though not as heavily as most examples.
• Tim in The Cleveland Show, frequently mentioning Jesus and his desire to get into Heaven.
• Stan Smith on American Dad!. "Daesong Heavy Industries" even had his go through a Crisis of Faith thanks to Steve flagging several Plot Holes in the Bible.
• Family Guy:
  • Downplayed for Lois Griffin. She doesn't really seem to practice but she does force the family to attend church.
  • Inverted for Brian Griffin. "Not All Dogs Go To Heaven" establishes that he's the one member of the family who isn't religious. "Jesus, Mary & Joseph" has Stewie call him out on this, noting that the family has met, and hosted, Jesus.