St. Martha's Parish

St. Martha's Parish
Name	St. Martha's Parish
Location	Plainview
First appearance	Diary of a Wimpy Kid (online)
Last appearance	Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Diper Överlöde

St. Martha's Parish is a Roman Catholic church located near Plainview where Greg Heffley and his family often attend church on Sundays. Its name was revealed in Diper Överlöde on its bulletin.

In the movie, it was filmed at Pacific Spirit United Church on West 45th Street in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.

History

Diary of a Wimpy Kid

The church issues a program called The Giving Tree where donations could be made for people struggling with money, thus, Greg Heffley's mom picks out a red wool sweater to donate to their Giving Tree guy.

Greg thinking this classmate is a jerk.

While looking through Rodrick Heffley's junk drawer, Greg finds one of his old middle school yearbooks where Rodrick wrote his opinions about every kid on their picture. Every once in a while, Greg sees Rodrick's old classmates at church and thanks him for making church more interesting.

Rodrick Rules

It was briefly mentioned when Greg, Manny and Susan were driving back from there. In the book, the church is located on Surrey Street. The church plays a more prominent role in the film of the same name, where the film loosely references events in The Last Straw. However in the film, Greg does not give $20, and Greg's kilt is actually a scarf and a sweater that get pulled off by Rodrick Heffley, instead of staying on in the book, followed by Greg getting called out by Taylor Pringle. This leads to Rodrick laughing at Greg, which leads to the latter wrestling the former in front of the whole church, embarrassing the family. Frank carries them out of the church while Susan scolds them. The wrestling does not happen in the book.

The Last Straw

Greg at church

In the book "The Last Straw," Greg goes to church with his family on Easter. As he gets out of the car, he realizes there is chocolate on his pants. To cover it up, Susan lends him her sweater to wear as a kilt. During the service, Greg is seated three rows in front of Holly Hills, his crush. When they start singing a hymn, Joe Heffley grabs Greg's hand and won't let go, even after the song is over. Greg signals to Joe that he's not happy by making a cuckoo sign. Later, when they pass around baskets for donations, Greg asks Susan for money to impress Holly, but he accidentally puts in a twenty-dollar bill instead of a one. Greg also insults Manny by calling him a "Ploopy," causing Manny to cry loudly and disrupt the service. The minister has to pause the service and Greg's family has to leave.

When Greg returns to church a second time, he gets a chance to shake hands with Holly Hills.

Dog Days

Greg thinking about taking money

Greg said that the sermon today was "Jesus in Disguise" which was about how you should treat everyone you meet with kindness because that person could be Jesus pretending to be someone else. Greg states that its supposed to make you wanna be a better person but all it does is make him paranoid because he knows he's gonna end up guessing wrong. When they passed down the donation basket, Greg tries to grab a handful of the money to pay off the eighty-three dollar smoothie bill but Susan saw the look in his eye and passed it to the row behind them.

It also briefly appears on page 144 with Greg and Susan behind Heather Hills and Holly Hills when Greg was describing Heather Hills.

Cabin Fever

After spending the night at the Heffley-house, Rowley tags along with Greg and his family to a service at their church. During the course of the service, Greg notices how Rowley seems confused about certain things and unsure of what to do at certain points -- this makes Greg deduce that Rowley and his family must not go to church that much (if at all).

Later in the book, Greg and his family go to the folk service (which takes place later in the morning than the service they usually go to). Greg mentions that last week, Susan convinced Rodrick to join the band showing a flyer saying that they were looking for a "percussionist". Since Rodrick thought was going to get to play his drums at church, he signed up -- but the folk group were looking for someone to play hand percussionist instruments (like maracas) -- Rodrick tried to look cool but he couldn't really pull that off as he was holding a pair of maracas. Greg relates to getting duped into something without knowing all the details. Last Year, he joined the church's Pre-Teen group but he then found out they were really lax about what qualified as one.

Greg then talks about The Giving Tree and sends in a request asking for money. Church last appears on page 215 where Susan says it is time to go to it and gives Greg, Rodrick and Manny V-Neck sweaters. Greg puts his clothes over his pajamas making a mistake. After he got home, he went upstairs to change. He had puddles of sweat in his shoes so he had to empty it out into the sink.

The Third Wheel

Greg playing it cool with one of his friends at church

After everyone has heard about Greg's mom making Greg wear her winter coat, he decides that his best shot is to take someone who doesn't go to his school to the dance and he has found the perfect place to look: church as their school students think that public school kids are pretty tough so whenever Greg runs into one of his friends he makes sure to play it cool. Recently Susan has became friends with Mrs. Stringer at church as they both worked on the Fall Fair Committee. The Stringer family has two kids that go to church school: Wesley and Laurel.

Hard Luck

flashback when Greg and Rodrick are sleeping during service in their Body Blankies

It is briefly seen in a flashback when Greg and Rodrick are sleeping during service in their Body Blankies, which Greg thinks is the reason he lost it after that.

It is also possible that is was not at the church, but in a similar building.

The Long Haul

It makes a brief flashback when Greg said that Rodrick slept through half of the Easter service before anyone realized he was missing, which probably got him in big trouble as Susan didn't look too happy to see him in the back.

Old School

Greg mentions that a few months ago they went to brunch after it.

Double Down

In a flashback, Greg and his family sit behind the Bartlemens at it. Their 5th grade son Tevin Bartleman who looks like Curtis Litz, who Greg made up so Susan won't stop packing a snack in his lunchbox, caught her eye and behind it she told his parents that they a raising a rotten kid and he owes her some apples.

Big Shot

Greg mentions a time when Frank took him to the city to watch a football game, what the stuck with him was that they tried to make it entertaining for the fans and his church can learn a few things from it like:

Greg's image of his church if they took one of his suggestions

• When they introduce the priest they should dim the lights and play some loud music.
• They could have a mascot to make the service fun for little kids.
• They could put in a half-time show as there's all sorts of crazy stuff you could do for entertainment.
• The biggest upgrade would be if they added a Jumbotron as it would help people at the back feel closer to the action.
  • They could have a random draw to let people who came late sit at the front.
  • Plus, they could encourage people to be a bit more generous when they walk past the donation basket.

Greg has sent those suggestions to the church but he hasn't heard back from them yet. It's likely that the church ignored his ideas entirely as Greg put his suggestions in the offertory, which was for donations to the church, not for suggestions, and because the ideas lean away from the church's true purpose.

Diper Överlöde

Advised by Sebastian Sleeves, Löded Diper looks for a way to perform while getting paid. Susan tells Rodrick there are plenty of people who needs a band for their events however, advertising in newspapers is too expensive. Alternatively, the band decides to put their ads in the church bulletin though, it proved to be ineffective as they hadn't gotten a single offer.

Observing the bulletin, today's service celebrates the life of Edward M. Row. There will also be a church raffle event where you can win a bouncy house for your child's next birthday party. The church's basement was apparently flooded which forces the next Youth Group meeting to be held in the rec hall.

Rowley Jefferson's Awesome Friendly Spooky Stories

When Rowley searches how to get rid of a demon, one of the websites said you could get rid of a demon with holy water but he was pretty sure church was closed at 10pm.

Online

During the church's first appearance, Greg sees his former friend, Ben Fielders and his family. Greg states his mom makes sure he and Ben stay away from each due to a time when Ben pulls out some dried up peas after he and Greg said "Peas be with you" to each other.

In the next visit, the church had a new music director that stretches out every song and Greg finds his family to be sitting 3 rows behind the Matthews family which he finds exciting. Ann and Frank also let Manny bring in a bunch of toys to occupied himself something they never let Greg do as a kid. Greg passes the time by counting the number of moles on Mr. Fisher's neck while Rodrick picks at a scab on his hand that he never lets heal.

After Greg calls Manny a Pootie, Ann makes him confess after church.

Frank didn't get to see Greg throwing the game for the Red Socks because he became the reader at church.

It's stated after church Greg asked Ann if she could take him to the book store to buy a Dungeons and Dragons book.

Trivia

• The church is the most recurring place in the series.
• Greg claims that the church's Easter Sunday-service always ends up being at least two hours long.
• Prior to its confirmation as a Catholic church in Diper Överlöde, there were various indications in throughout the series of it being a Catholic church, such as the use of confessionals (at least in the original online version). Jeff Kinney himself grew up in a Catholic-family.

Appearances

• Diary of a Wimpy Kid (online)
• Diary of a Wimpy Kid (in flashback)
• Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Rodrick Rules (mentioned)
• Diary of a Wimpy Kid: The Last Straw
• Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Dog Days
• Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Cabin Fever
• Diary of a Wimpy Kid: The Third Wheel (in flashback)
• Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Hard Luck (in flashback)
• Diary of a Wimpy Kid: The Long Haul (in flashback)
• Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Old School (mentioned)
• Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Double Down (in flashback)
• Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Big Shot
• Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Diper Överlöde
• Rowley Jefferson's Awesome Friendly Spooky Stories (mentioned)
• Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Rodrick Rules (2011 film)

Gallery

Online

Diary of a Wimpy Kid

The Last Straw

Dog Days

Cabin Fever

The Third Wheel

Hard Luck

Big Shot

Diper Överlöde

Rodrick Rules (2011)