jesus camp
I watched Jesus Camp this weekend and I’m more or less at a loss for words (but here’s a post anyway). I’m sure that this film represents a very strange and zealous portion of the evangelical movement, and that the people featured most prominently therein do not necessarily speak for the majority of their faith. These are, after all, kids and parents who are willing to attend a camp not just about their religion, but about how to preach that religion to others.
What’s strange to me is that Becky Fischer, who runs the “Kids On Fire School of Ministry” that is the subject of the documentary, does not seem like all that bad of a person. She truly believes that she is doing holy work. She truly believes that she is reaching out to children to give them faith and power. She’s portrayed as very creative and personable throughout the film, and I’m sure she’d be a great teacher if she didn’t believe that the Earth is 6,000 years old and that Islam trains its children to be suicide bombers.
Fischer’s camp strikes me as nothing so much as brain washing. Lou Engle shows up to drill anti-abortion rhetoric into the brains of ten year-olds. By the end they’re literally screaming, “RIGHTEOUS JUDGES,” tears streaming down their faces, wailing for the unborn. This is, needless to say, disturbing.
The two evangelical kids that get the most screen time, Levi and Rachael, are remarkable by themselves. Both are amazingly charismatic and articulate, especially given their ages, and really do seem to be true believers. Rachael likes the energy of evangelical churches (“God likes to go to those churches.”) and handing out religious tracts to strangers. Levi was born again at age five, preaching by nine, and is already cultivating a ferocious mullet. I’m sorry, I know that’s a cheap shot to take at a kid, but to look at the hair cascading down his shoulders is to gaze into a web of madness.
It’s not all horror and secular indignation with Jesus Camp, though. You can’t help but laugh as Fischer walks through the main auditorium of the camp with her staff, asking Jesus to bless the seats, bless the electrical system, and yes, bless the Powerpoint, because, “Devil we know what you love to do in meetings like this.” I used to work in the administrative office of BU’s student union, and honestly, I’m with Fischer on this one. If the Devil exists he really does have a penchant for ruining peoples’ Powerpoint presentations.
Then there’s Ted Haggard. While his comments about there being 80 million evangelicals in the country (questionable) and the evangelical vote deciding national elections stirred a lot of controversy, the real fun comes when Jesus Camp gives you a sample of his sermon. It proves two things. One, Sigmund Freud was right. He warned his fellow psychoanalysts to be wary whenever a patient uses the words “For instance” and “hypothetically,” because these hypotheticals are always anything but. Two, it validates a theory I’ve been working on for years: If God exists, he has an amazing sense of humor.
All things considered, Jesus Camp is probably worth a rental. It’s certainly not the best documentary I’ve ever seen, but if you’re looking to sit with your mouth agape for 90 minutes, this is the one to watch. Richard Dawkins’s chapters from The God Delusion on children and religion rang particularly loudly in my ears for the duration. I feel for these poor kids, I really do. I hope that one day they get to make up their minds for themselves. In the meantime, the “Kids on Fire School of Ministry” has been shut down due to backlash from the documentary.
Well, I’d like to open with a prayer: Jesus, save me from your followers.
I also watched this documentary this weekend with my friend Rachel. I found Ms. Fischer’s use of the phrase “using children” throughout the film to be very apt. Rachel and I were both struck by the complete lack of a sense of irony on the part of Ms. Fischer. She speaks of Muslims indoctrinating their children and training them for violence, and oh look, footage of children in her ministry in army camo grease paint. Yeah, that’s good. Let’s glorify militarism while we condemn other religions for training their children to kill, and let’s do it with a straight face.
Speaking of a complete lack of a sense of irony, how about pro-life “Christians” who kill? May the fetusses they save be gay.
As the saying goes, “you can lead a horse to water, but you can’t enroll an aborted fetus in Jesus Camp.”