Father Peter Westley is a priest, a teacher at the St. Attalus College in Santa Barbara, and a long-time acquaintance of Shawn and Gus. He is portrayed by Ray Wise.
Appearances[]
The Devil's in the Details... and the Upstairs Bedroom[]
Father Westley was first introduced in "The Devil's in the Details... and the Upstairs Bedroom". He was the church school teacher of a young Shawn and Gus who wasn't sure how to handle Shawn's questioning of such things as Noah's Ark, and recommended he and his father Henry to a "Methodist Church down the street". In the present, there is a supposed suicide at St. Attalus College, and Father Westley believes the girl jumped and killed herself because she was demonically possessed. After further investigation by Psych, where Gus agrees with Westley, while Shawn is the skeptic, they encounter another girl who is believed to be possessed. Father Westley performs an exorcism on the girl, and she then stops acting strangely.
After the exorcism it turns out that the first girl was drugged with L-Dopa, a drug Father Westley takes for Parkinson's Disease, and it is believed Westley drugged the girls so he could create fake exorcisms, to prove exorcisms were still needed. Father Westley maintains his innocence in jail, and gives Gus a clue about who had it out for first girl, through a part in the bible. It turned out the girl who got the exorcism was faking, and actually drugged the first girl using Westley's drugs. Father Westley was then freed, and thanked Shawn and Gus for proving his innocence.
Dual Spires[]
In S5E12 "Dual Spires", Shawn and Gus call Father Westley to translate Latin that they found in Paula Merral's diary. He relays most of it, but is cut off before he can finish. Due to this sudden hang-up and a passage in Paula's diary where she wrote that she feels she is in danger, he suspects the duo are in trouble and decides to make his way over to Dual Spires himself. By complete coincidence he arrives to town just after a fire has started in the library, and when he sees the tandem bike he realizes Shawn and Gus are inside and rescues them with a fire axe. He and our duo are then taken to a cabin by Robert Barker, who explains the town's history and gives Shawn the final puzzle pieces he needs to realize that sheriff Andrew Jackson and doctor Donna Gooden killed Paula Merral. The murderous pair then come in to kill everyone inside the cabin, including Father Westley. However, he had had the foresight to call Lassiter and Juliet before arriving in Dual Spires, who come to rescue everyone.
Psych 3: This Is Gus[]
Gus chooses Father Westley as the marriage officiant that will wed him and Selene. When the gang are at the brewery works and Selene suddenly starts going into labor, Gus insists they be married before she gives birth and connects to Father Westley via Zoom. All throughout the wedding ceremony, he sometimes starts behaving as if he were performing an exorcism just purely out of habit. He instructs Shawn to deliver the baby, and since it isn't waiting Gus and Selene skip their vows and the Corinthians 13 interlude and go straight to the "I dos". As soon as Father Westley pronounces the loving couple husband and wife, he joins everyone else in their chorus of "Push!" and witnesses the baby's birth.
Trivia[]
- Father Westley was brought back for "Dual Spires" because actor Ray Wise was part of the main cast of Twin Peaks. A reference is made to his character Leland Palmer when he shows up with white hair, something he explains by claiming that he wanted to cover up some gray but it went terribly awry due to a mistake by Sister Rita.
- He thinks that The Village is a ridiculous film.
- He's mentioned in S6E3 "This Episode Sucks" when Gus tells Shawn that Father Westley blessed some water over the phone to make it holy water so that they could spray it on vampires.
- As Shawn and Gus are picking out bouquets Gus mentions that Father Westley is also on Cameo, a website where celebrities can send personalized messages to their fans.
- During Gus and Selene's wedding, he says that he suspected that Gus's wedding would be "a day for all to remember" ever since Gus was a child.
- He passes on the opportunity to be in Curt Smith's music video because he's "more of a crooner".