# How could Harry Potter have a "godfather"? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [June 5, 2004, 4:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-could-harry-potter-have-a-godfather/248820 "2004-06-05T16:32:03Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Diceman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Diceman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diceman)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2004, 4:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-could-harry-potter-have-a-godfather/248820/61 "2004-06-07T16:49:50Z")
We’ve all overlooked the biggest Christian reference of all: **St. Mungo’s** Hospital for Magical Maladies. Altho’ this does raise several interesting questions. Such as, who cannonized St. Mungo? The Church of England? (Do they even have saints?) The Catholic Church? (if so, it would presumably have been prior to the Protestant Reformation.) Also, what would a wizard do that would get him cannonized? I would think that miracles wouldn’t be too impressive to a magical community, unless it was something that’s supposed to be impossible (like raising the dead). Perhaps he was a martyr, but since he has a hospital named after him, I would guess that he had something to do with healing. Perhaps he was a pioneer in healing magic or something like that. I’d say that this, combined with the fact that they celebrate Christmas, _not_ “Winter Solstice” or “Yuletime” or some other holiday, implies that religion in the wizarding world is not significantly different than religion in the muggle world. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Devil\_s\_Grandmother](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/74df32/32.png) [@The\_Devil\_s\_Grandmother](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Devil_s_Grandmother)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2004, 5:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-could-harry-potter-have-a-godfather/248820/62 "2004-06-07T17:25:32Z")
Interestingly, there is a [muggle St Mungo](http://dspace.dial.pipex.com/town/plaza/aaj50/mungo.htm). And what appears to be [homless shelter called St. Mungo’s](http://www.mungos.org/index.html) in London. ---
**Author:** ![susan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/susan/32/17537_2.png) [@susan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/susan)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2004, 6:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-could-harry-potter-have-a-godfather/248820/63 "2004-06-07T18:58:36Z")
Isn’t he the patron saint of Scotland? ---
**Author:** ![NE\_Texan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/e99b99/32.png) [@NE\_Texan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NE_Texan)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2004, 7:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-could-harry-potter-have-a-godfather/248820/64 "2004-06-07T19:06:21Z")
> [@Wendell Wagner](#): > > Why should the school examination system be just like the one in English schools (…)? [Cheeky answer mode] Well, you know some of the graduates of Hogwarts want to work for the Ministry of Magic (Percy, fer instance). And that’s a gummint job, innit? So they need to come out of an accredited school. Which means you need a curriculum, standardized tests, testing boards… So it looks the same because it has to satisfy the same government. [/ end of ridikkulus cheeky answer] ---
**Author:** ![susan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/susan/32/17537_2.png) [@susan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/susan)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2004, 7:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-could-harry-potter-have-a-godfather/248820/65 "2004-06-07T19:06:25Z")
Here you go: [http://dspace.dial.pipex.com/town/plaza/aaj50/mungo.htm](http://dspace.dial.pipex.com/town/plaza/aaj50/mungo.htm) > [@](#): > > St Mungo … was even supposed to be related to King Arthur, apparently being his great-nephew. > > According to Jocelin of Furness, Tenew had an affair (he says with her cousin, Owain). When her father found that she was pregnant, he was obliged to follow the law of the times, which was that sex outside marriage was a capital offence, and kill her. (Jocelin says that Loth was pagan. But all the Arthur stories point to Loth being Christian). He decided to throw her off Traprain Law, a large hill outside Edinburgh and which at the time was still used a fortified settlement. However, she survived the fall. That apparently was not enough for Loth or his subjects, **who were in two minds as to whether she might be a witch (emphasis mine).**… > > …There, on the beach, she gave birth to Mungo, or Kentigern as his proper name is. (Mungo is the nickname given by St Serf, but there is debate as to what it means. Some say “My Hound”, others “my dear heart”. Kentigern means “Chief Lord”.) … > > The story is almost certainly some sort of gloss on the fact that Mungo was illegitimate. > > The next point in the story is Mungo’s election as a bishop. … > > He went south, first into the southern part of Rheged, into what is now Cumbria, where there are many churches dedicated to him, and then to what is now Wales. … > > …this makes Mungo founder of Glasgow. When Mungo died, he was buried in his own community, making the site one of pilgrimage and importance. Around it arose a township, and by the 12th century it was a cathedral city. > > …The city’s coat of arms, which was the same as that of the old pre-reformation diocese (for the simple reason that the bishop was the civil power in the city until the 17th century), shows the saint at the top and … contains elements linked directly to Mungo. There is his bell. The bird and the salmon with a ring refer to two of his miracles. The bird, a robin, had been a pet of St Serf, but some fellow classmates, jealous of Mungo, killed it, hoping to pin the blame on him. Mungo restored it to life. > > The salmon and the ring relat to Queen Longuoreth’s adultery with a young soldier and Mungo’s saving of the Queen. … > > In prison, she sends a messenger to Mungo asking for forgiveness and aid. When the messenger arrives, he is immediately told by the bishop to go fishing in the Clyde and to bring back straightway the first fish he catches. This is a salmon, which, on being cut open, is seen to contain the ring. … > > Exactly what gave Mungo his reputation will not be known this side of the grave. Suffice it to say that there was clearly something in the man - maybe it was great holiness - that made the memory of him endure through the centuries. … > > He died on 13th January, 613, and there is a final interesting point in Jocelin’s Life. Jocelin admits that he used earlier written sources but that he edited them because he found some of the stories incomprehensible. He tells us however, that on the Octave of the Feast of the Epiphany (13th January), Mungo entered a vessel filled with warm water and then, encircled by his brethren, “yielded up his spirit”. It has been suggested that Jocelin was unaware that he was distorting a more credible story involving an a mass Epiphany baptism. The suggestion is that at Epiphany Mungo conducted such a baptism, which at the time was still done by complete immersion. In early January it is still rather cold in Glasgow, and even today it is customary in the locality to warm up water for baptism. The thesis is that Mungo went into warmed up water to administer baptism but then caught a cold and died a week later. The date of his death is kept as his feast day. ---
**Author:** ![cmkeller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cmkeller/32/118_2.png) [@cmkeller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cmkeller)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2004, 7:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-could-harry-potter-have-a-godfather/248820/66 "2004-06-07T19:13:34Z")
Shoshanna: > [@](#): > > How many non-Jewish people know how to wrap tfillin, even in cities with huge Jewish populations? Well, Madonna does, at least. ---
**Author:** ![elfkin477](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/a9a28c/32.png) [@elfkin477](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elfkin477)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2004, 10:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-could-harry-potter-have-a-godfather/248820/67 "2004-06-07T22:13:06Z")
> [@Exapno Mapcase](#): > > My take on the subject is that the minority culture always has a **hugely** greater understanding of the majority culture than the other way around. \ If the wizards have to live in a Muggle world, then they have - **have** - to be totally knowledgeable about that world. Any other route would be disastrous. I don’t think this is necessarily true. They might know **more** about the majority, but there’s got to be a lot they simply ignore or never noticed. I’m a minority of sorts, but not a religious one. I’m a leftie. That means I do things differently than a good 90% of people I see each and every day. Depite seeing right-handed people up close 365 days a year, I _still_ had to have how they use a can-opener explained to me (exactly the same way I do, which makes left-handed can-openers a bigger puzzle), and I suspect, yet cannot verify that more of them wipe with their left hands than right. Short of a survey or violating their privacy while in the bathroom, there’s no way for me to know with any degree of certainty. There are many other things I also couldn’t explain how they were different, just that they did them differently. Even though you’re aware that the majority is doing something differently, it’s fairly easy to not pay attention to those differences if they don’t interfere with your own life. I wouldn’t be surprised if the wizards overlooked a lot of things muggles do, because they’re not very interested, and it doesn’t hurt them not to know about those things. Frankly, I don’t think muggles are any more facinating than the right-handed, so they’re not that observable. Besides, if they _did_ know everything about muggles merely from interacting with them, why would there be Muggle Studies classes? ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2004, 10:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-could-harry-potter-have-a-godfather/248820/68 "2004-06-07T22:41:17Z")
Lefties are not quite the same thing as a suspicious, hated, and persecuted minority. Makes sort of a huge difference, you see. ---
**Author:** ![elfkin477](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/a9a28c/32.png) [@elfkin477](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elfkin477)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2004, 10:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-could-harry-potter-have-a-godfather/248820/69 "2004-06-07T22:53:06Z")
> [@Exapno Mapcase](#): > > Lefties are not quite the same thing as a suspicious, hated, and persecuted minority. Makes sort of a huge difference, you see. **Now** , in the US and a few other nations, they’re not. That’s a recent change, and hardly global. If you do some research on how lefties have historically been treated, I think you’d be surprised. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Devil\_s\_Grandmother](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/74df32/32.png) [@The\_Devil\_s\_Grandmother](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Devil_s_Grandmother)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2004, 11:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-could-harry-potter-have-a-godfather/248820/70 "2004-06-07T23:04:00Z")
Er, I think \*\*elfkin477 \*\* was just trying to make a point about observable behavior. ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2004, 12:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-could-harry-potter-have-a-godfather/248820/71 "2004-06-08T00:35:14Z")
The Heraldic term for left is “sinister” 🙂 Though I am right handed, I pick up a meaduring cup with my left hand so that I may pour into it or stir with my right, and the units are on the wrong side. Others suffer, too. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Diceman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Diceman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diceman)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2004, 2:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-could-harry-potter-have-a-godfather/248820/72 "2004-06-08T02:15:56Z")
So there’s a real honest-to-God St. Mungo, eh? Wow. With a name like “Mungo,” I just assumed that Rowling made him up, and he was supposed to be a fictional saint known only to the wizarding world. ---
**Author:** ![Lamia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Lamia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lamia)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2004, 2:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-could-harry-potter-have-a-godfather/248820/73 "2004-06-08T02:17:23Z")
> [@elfkin477](#): > > Even though you’re aware that the majority is doing something differently, it’s fairly easy to not pay attention to those differences if they don’t interfere with your own life. I wouldn’t be surprised if the wizards overlooked a lot of things muggles do, because they’re not very interested, and it doesn’t hurt them not to know about those things. You got it. Some of the most memorable and comic examples of ignorance of Muggle culture we’ve seen are those like confusion over how telephones and the postal system work, and these are things wizards have no use for in their daily life. They have magical means of long-distance communication (including the Owl Post) that probably long predate the telephone or any reliable Muggle mail service. They’ve been doing things their way for a long time and it works pretty well for them. Few have reason to care how Muggles do things. Judging from my knowledge of real-world schools and students, I would guess that even if Muggles Studies classes included lessons on things like “The Operation of the Telephone” the information would seem so abstract, useless, and dull to students that no one would pay much attention. Although wizards are a minority group they can isolate themselves from the Muggle majority effectively, and it appears that it’s not necessary for them to blend in all _that_ well anyway. When we’ve seen wizards out and about in the Muggle world they come across as eccentrics, hippies, crazy old ladies and doddering old men. They don’t have to seem normal, just as long as no one suspects they’re actually _magical_. Even in the past when Muggles were attempting to kill witches and wizards it wasn’t essential that witches and wizards be able to “pass” successfully as ordinary Muggles. We know from Harry’s homework that they could easily use their magic to protect themselves. The only people Muggles managed to hurt were other Muggles mistakenly believed to have magical powers. ---
**Author:** ![susan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/susan/32/17537_2.png) [@susan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/susan)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2004, 3:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-could-harry-potter-have-a-godfather/248820/74 "2004-06-08T03:31:34Z")
> [@](#): > > When we’ve seen wizards out and about in the Muggle world they come across as eccentrics, hippies, crazy old ladies and doddering old men. This is what I love about the Pacific Northwest–there’s no way to tell wizards from Muggles when you see them on the street. ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2004, 7:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-could-harry-potter-have-a-godfather/248820/75 "2004-06-08T07:47:52Z")
Lamia writes: \> I just don’t understand why you trouble yourself with books that apparently \> irritate you. Seems like a waste of time to me. I started the series because there was this huge amount of publicity about the books. (Actually, to be really specific, I read the first one because the book discussion group I’m belong to read it several years ago.) All the publicity seemed to be saying that the series was the best new fantasy series in decades. I like fantasy, so it was natural to want to read something that was praised so much (at least in the publicity releases for the book). In reading the first book, I said, “Wow, this is . . . underwhelming. It’s not at all a bad book, but it’s pretty minor.” I continued to read the series as it came out for several reasons. Partly it’s because I’m a completist. This is why I don’t start long fantasy series until I’ve been told by reviewers I can trust that it’s worth reading the whole series. Partly it’s because when I object to elements in the series as I read it, fans of the books say, “Oh, no, you didn’t read the entire series. Unless you have read every chapter, word, letter, and punctuation mark in the series you can’t talk about the books.” And I don’t know exactly what you mean by “trouble [myself] with [the] books.” I wouldn’t post to a thread that’s about the literary quality of the series. It’s just not worth the hassle. But this thread is about a more objective point about the books, which is whether the background is consistent. ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2004, 7:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-could-harry-potter-have-a-godfather/248820/76 "2004-06-08T07:50:24Z")
Lamia writes: \> When we’ve seen wizards out and about in the Muggle world they come \> across as eccentrics, hippies, crazy old ladies and doddering old men. Cite? (Or is this just your own guess, as opposed to something that Rowling says?) ---
**Author:** ![Lamia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Lamia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lamia)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2004, 1:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-could-harry-potter-have-a-godfather/248820/77 "2004-06-08T13:02:18Z")
> [@Wendell Wagner](#): > > I started the series because there was this huge amount of publicity about the books. (Actually, to be really specific, I read the first one because the book discussion group I’m belong to read it several years ago.) All the publicity seemed to be saying that the series was the best new fantasy series in decades. I like fantasy, so it was natural to want to read something that was praised so much (at least in the publicity releases for the book). In reading the first book, I said, “Wow, this is . . . underwhelming. It’s not at all a bad book, but it’s pretty minor.” Were people really calling it a great fantasy series? All I remember is it being praised as a good and unexpectedly popular _children’s_ series. I was still living at home when the first book came out, and my mother (who did her Master’s thesis on children and reading) went out and bought it because she was curious to see what sort of book had managed to appeal to so many kids who didn’t previously read for fun. I’d have been disappointed too if I’d been expecting “the best new fantasy series in decades”. > [@](#): > > - > > Cite? (Or is this just your own guess, as opposed to something that Rowling says?) \*I did say “when we’ve seen”, didn’t I? I cannot recall any example from any of the books of a witch or wizard who successfully managed to pass as Joe/Jane Average among the Muggles. From the ones Uncle Vernon sees on the street at the beginning of Book One to the confrontation on the train platform at the ending of Book Five, they clearly strike Muggles (or at least Muggles like the Dursleys) as a bunch of weirdos. Their fondness for capes and brightly colored clothing are enough to raise some eyebrows. In Book Five we even learn that… Mrs. Figg, the neighborhood Crazy Cat Lady, grew up in the wizarding world. She has no magical ability herself, but is culturally a witch. She’s lived largely as a Muggle for at least most of Harry’s life yet only seems “normal” insofar as she’s a familiar kind of suburban eccentric. There may be witches and wizards who are better at blending in than the ones we’ve seen, but most would have no reason to work at imitating a perfectly average Muggle. I can’t think of many situations where it wouldn’t be good enough to pass as a colorful, strange, or loony-but-harmless Muggle. ---
**Author:** ![FaerieBeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e95f7d/32.png) [@FaerieBeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FaerieBeth)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2004, 1:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-could-harry-potter-have-a-godfather/248820/78 "2004-06-08T13:52:22Z")
> [@carnivorousplant](#): > > The Heraldic term for left is “sinister” 🙂 And the term for right is “dexter”. I am now picturing GW in his lab. Does this make Jeb “DeeDee”? 😉 As to the OP, I suppose many children in the UK may have a godparent. It seems to be more of a cultural reference than a religious one. Being married to someone who is “culturally Catholic” has given me plenty of insight into traditions that are eventually coopted by the secular world, and that observing those traditions have very little to do with faith or religion. I usually don’t try to pick apart what I mainly consider a “fun read”. It’s like arguing the Nobel prize criteria as they would apply to a centerfold model. ymmv FB ---
**Author:** ![Lamia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Lamia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lamia)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2004, 2:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-could-harry-potter-have-a-godfather/248820/79 "2004-06-08T14:24:00Z")
I literally just occurred to me that the godparent most familiar to many children is probably Cinderella’s Fairy Godmother. So I doubt godparents are going to appear out of place in a fantasy novel to the average kid. They’re an established fairy tale element. Now that I think of it, I seem to dimly remember some other child telling me when I was little that I couldn’t possibly have a godmother, because godmothers weren’t real. They were only in stories, like giants or unicorns or what have you. I don’t think any child is going to read these books and say “But how can Harry have a godfather if it hasn’t been made explicit that wizards practice the rite of baptism?” Spoilers for Book Three: The world’s second most famous godparent is probably The Godfather from…uh…_The Godfather_. A lot of kids have probably heard of him too, even if they’re too young to see the movie. So when they read that Sirius Black is Harry’s godfather, they may conjure up a mental picture of a man with magical powers who is also a dangerous criminal…which is just how they’re meant to think of Black for most of the book. I don’t know if Rowling had this in mind or not, but it works pretty well. ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2004, 2:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-could-harry-potter-have-a-godfather/248820/80 "2004-06-08T14:40:33Z")
> [@Lamia](#): > > I literally just occurred to me that the godparent most familiar to many children is probably Cinderella’s Fairy Godmother. Would that be true in England? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-could-harry-potter-have-a-godfather/248820.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-could-harry-potter-have-a-godfather/248820.md?page=5)