The Father, the Son and the Holy Guest Star/References

Episode	References	Gags	Appearances	Gallery	Quotes	Credits

◄ Home Away from Homer

The Father, the Son and the Holy Guest Star

The Bonfire of the Manatees ►

Cultural References

• Scooby-Doo: The Ministry Machine is an obvious parody of the Mystery Machine.
• The title is a reference to the Christian sign of the cross: In the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost (Spirit).
• Marge's cellphone ringtone theme is the tune to Hawaii Five-O.
• The song that Homer, Bart and the other Catholics are dancing to in Marge's dream is Riverdance by Bill Whalen. This song is also played in the credits.
• Homer confuses Plutarch with Mickey Mouse's dog, Pluto.
• The ragtime music video playing during the montage of Homer and Bart at the Catholic school is called "Maple Leaf Rag," a public-domain ragtime piano piece composed by Scott Joplin in 1899.

Continuity

• "Whacking Day": Bart gets expelled from school, and goes to a religious school (only there, he's immediately kicked out. Here, he stays and, after a rough start, actually fits in).
• "Lisa Gets an 'A'" and "Homer Simpson in: "Kidney Trouble"": Marge and Reverend Lovejoy are both prejudiced against Catholics.
• "Bart Sells His Soul": A Simpson female (Lisa/Marge) is worried over Bart's soul.
• "Radioactive Man": A boy character (Bart/Milhouse) gets his limbs tied to dogs (in a failed attempt at growing an inch taller/as part of his execution).
• "Homer the Heretic", "The Joy of Sect" and "She Of Little Faith": a Simpson family member attempts to convert to a new religion and Marge, Ned, and Reverend Lovejoy attempt to bring that family member back.

Trivia

• It is made clear in this episode that most of the main characters in Springfield are Protestants, who attend Rev. Lovejoy's church. The episode does give some insight into who are the (probable) Roman Catholics in Springfield. At the church's pancake dinner one can spot: Bumblebee Man (Hispanic); Mayor Quimby (Irish, but he may only be attending a community event for political reasons); Luigi and two members of Fat Tony's crew (Italian). Fat Tony is sitting at a different table as his fellow mob members.
• This episode was nominated for the 2006 WGA Award (TV) for Animation.
• This episode was originally scheduled to air on April 10, 2005 in America. It was pulled due to the death of Pope John Paul II the previous week, meaning that the original final episode of the season, "The Girl Who Slept Too Little", was replaced with this episode and ended up being a holdover episode that aired during the start of season 17.

Goofs

• Lisa states that Latin is Plutarch's language. However, Plutarch was a Greek who wrote in Greek during the Roman Empire.
• Homer asks how Catholics can stand not eating meat on Fridays, but this practice is no longer mandatory for Catholics, except on Good Friday.
• It took Marge five years to toilet-train Bart. But in "Sweet Seymour Skinner's Baadasssss Song", he was about two before he was toilet trained. This was probably a failed attempt, though.
• It would be illegal for Bart to be expelled for something there was no evidence of him doing. Springfield Elementary always pulls stuff like this, whether considered canon or not. They stuck Bart with three months' detention for the Scotchtoberfest sting, which also was legally dubious, tried to force Lisa not to confess that she cheated just so they can keep grant money they sorely need (which was probably misappropriated anyway), left behind kids at the Diznee-Land War Reenactment Park (including Uter, who was at the school on foreign exchange), would cannibalize the students if it meant cutting back on the food budget and getting rid of undesirable students, and have rules in the school handbook saying that none of the teachers are responsible if Bart dies or if the kids get eaten by the school's pet snake.
• It is never explained how Bart goes back to Springfield Elementary School. Although one theory is that Rev. Lovejoy must have bribed or forced Skinner to take Bart back. Or it could be possible that the school found out that Bart was innocent at some point.
• On Disney+, this episode is episode 20 while "Home Away from Homer" is the season finale.

Production Notes

• The final draft for this episode was published on June 30, 2004.

June 30, 2004