In this period drama series, the young, unexperienced Catholic priest Erik Odekerke -who keeps a diary, and is once described as a (pastoral) 'sheperd dog', gets his first assignment, as kapelaan -literally 'chaplain', but in Dutch still in assistant to the parish's curate- in a mining town in Dutch Limburg.

In the late 19th century, a young woman moves to Amsterdam with her family and tries to make a living. Preyed upon by various men, she nonetheless rises in society.

The story of a small and conservative West-Flemish village opposing the construction of a bridge over the Scheldt.