US TV star Rainn Wilson has called for more positive and “kind” Christian characters to be portrayed on film and television.
Wilson, best known for his role as Dwight Schrute in the US version of The Office, has accused Hollywood of having an “anti-Christian bias”.
After watching the most recent episode of The Last Of Us, the actor took to Twitter to air his grievances, saying he knew the villain would be the bad guy the moment the storyline featured him reading scripture.
“I do think there is an anti-Christian bias in Hollywood. As soon as the David character in ‘The Last of Us’ started reading from the Bible I knew that he was going to be a horrific villain.
“Could there be a Bible-reading preacher on a show who is actually loving and kind?” Wilson tweeted.
In the post-apocalyptic show, a Christian preacher turns out to be a cannibal and a rapist, who justifies his behaviour by Bible quotations.
Reflecting on the sentiments shared by Wilson, Rev Simon Carver, a minister and film critic, told Premier Christian News: “I think there's sometimes this idea that if people are going to be spouting Bible verses, and preaching, they've got some sort of religious mania, and that's associated with doing crazy things.
“I think that that is an issue, but I think what is more of an issue is that ordinary Christians are not seen as just being ordinary people. They're seen as being sort of odd in some way and hypocritical, or any of those things.”
Wilson himself is not a Christian – he belongs to the Baha'i faith.