Movie Review: Jesus Camp

Jesus Camp

I first heard of this Oscar™-nominated documentary in connection with the discredited evangelical preacher, Ted Haggard. The Reverend Haggard, who founded and headed a mega-church in Colorado Springs, was removed from his responsibilities after allegations he'd used illegal drugs and secured the services of a homosexual prostitute. Before those charges were levied, though, Haggard appeared briefly in this film and then complained about the way in which he was portrayed. With an introductory background like that, how was I going to turn down the chance to see it when I got the opportunity?

Filmmakers Heidi Ewing and Rachel Grady determined to make Jesus Camp after they learned just how widespread and how, well, evangelical the evangelical movement is in this country. To tell the story, they chose to focus on a few people who are intimately involved in both one evangelical church or another as well as the "Kids on Fire Summer Camp" in Devil's Lake, North Dakota.

Levi is a young boy who dreams of being a preacher. He's clearly bright and is very articulate. His mother homeschools him, and has obviously done a credible job of it. That's what makes the next scene so disturbing: she proceeds to question him on such matters as global warming and evolution, both of which he categorically denies based on biblical accounts rather than anything relating to science. He's clearly accepted those falsehoods just as well and thoroughly as he's learned how to speak well and with an impressive vocabulary.

Rachael is nine. She's cute, energetic, and talks almost non-stop. In one scene, she's bowling with her family when she wanders over to a young woman at a nearby table. She very seriously tells the woman that God has told her she must speak with her, and that she must be saved. She leaves a brochure with the woman and returns to her family where her father praises her and tells her, "Way to obey!"

Victory (Tory) is ten. She's a pretty blonde who loves to dance. She very soberly tells the cameras that she dances for Jesus, and then admits that sometimes she dances "for the joy of the flesh." She assures the cameras, though, that she's trying really hard not to do that.

Becky Fischer is a youth minister and the founder of the "Kids on Fire Summer Camp." In her interviews, she shares with the camera that the Muslims indoctrinate their children at an early age, and that Christians must do the same. Later, she tells a radio talk show host that if she can reach children before the age of seven, she can turn them into soldiers for God.

Much of the interviews and intertwined discussions are leading directly toward this particular summer's camping experience. At the camp, parents and children spend time in services and seminars all of which are geared to fire them up and to prepare them to overwhelm the political process to "take America back." At one service, small children are sobbing hysterically because they are made painfully aware of the fact that they're bad. They beg Jesus for forgiveness. A small blonde boy sits on the floor and sobs heart-rendingly. Soon, some children are "speaking in tongues." The adults appear pleased.

Eventually, we travel with Levi to Washington DC for abortion protests on the steps of the US Supreme Court, and to Colorado Springs for a sermon by Ted Haggard (who, after gleefully mugging for the camera, gives young Levi some advice on sermon-making). In an interview, Haggard smiles his broadest, toothiest grin and says that evangelicals, if they vote, can win any election (for the record, this is one of the clips to which Haggard objects). Because the filmmakers have given us the occasional statistic throughout the course of the film, we've no choice but to acknowledge that Haggard is probably right about that.

I can't tell you that I enjoyed Jesus Camp because I didn't. I did, however, find it profoundly disturbing. The featured children and, I suspect, many of the others, are smart as whips. They're also utterly convinced that everything they've been told is right, and that anything contradictory must therefore be wrong. They're intolerant of others at best because, as Becky Fischer puts it, they've "got the truth." In the case of those who are homeschooled (one of the film's helpful statistical offerings informs us that the vast majority of homeschooled Americans are evangelicals), they're grievously lacking in science knowledge and the ability to think logically which, in my opinion, seriously hampers both the individual and society as a whole.

Fischer is, unfortunately, absolutely right about one thing: If you can get a child young enough and indoctrinate him thoroughly enough, he's going to grow up just as you intend him to be. And these children are effectively intended to be weapons. Oh, they may not blow themselves up as some Muslim children grow up to do, but I'm convinced the education process and the end goals aren't dissimilar. Both appeal to the highest and the lowest of emotions. Both employ fear and guilt at least as frequently as praise. And both are looking to convert everybody they can, and to subjugate everybody who won't convert to their own religious notions by force of law.

There's one moment on screen that I simply can't get over. It haunts me even several days later. It's a little girl with big eyes and a shy smile who talks of missionaries who are headed out to dangerous parts of the world. In her high-pitched voice, she says that these missionaries enjoy a send-off that includes others gathering around them and chanting, "Martyr, martyr, martyr!" And then that little girl opens her eyes even wider, smiles even more broadly, and looks right into the camera and says, "That is so cool!" No, sweetheart, that is so scary.

POLITICAL NOTES: Any group that's out to infringe the rights of others as a matter of course is dangerous to freedom by definition. The evangelical movement has more than a little power already, and it's likely destined to have more. President Bush owes at least one election to them; many politicians deliberately cater to them both during and after elections. As a result, we must be more vigilant than ever. While it doesn't really matter to me what religion a politician may espouse, it matters a great deal to me if he takes it as part and parcel of his office to make the rest of us follow along. That's what the evangelical movement is apparently aiming for, and if that goal is reached, every one of us who doesn't toe the line will suffer one way or another. Although the Constitution assures us freedom of worship and speech, and even the Bible claims that God Himself granted us free will, the evangelicals obviously don't see it that way.

FAMILY SUITABILITY: Jesus Camp is rated PG-13 for "some discussions of mature subject matter." I don't know that kids will really get Jesus Camp anyway. But any adult who's a little leery of those who would legislate morality (among other things) is going to find Jesus Camp a real eye-opener! As such, I recommend every adult see it. Know your enemy. However good and decent these people may be as friends, neighbors, and co-workers — and they are — if you value freedom, remember that their stated goal is to take it from you. And if that doesn't, at the bottom line, make them an enemy, I'm not sure what does.