Freaky Jesus

I just watched the documentary Jesus Camp, and I expected it to be off-putting, but I didn't expect to be as disturbed as I was. For those who don't know, Jesus camp is about a summer camp hosted by Evangelical Pentecostal Christians. They preach to the kids, get them to speak in tongues and teach them about how sinful the world is and how it's their job to fix it. The people who run this camp believe they are training an soldiers for God, so the approach they take to preaching to these kids uses a lot of military oriented language. The reasoning they give for the military theme of her preaching style is that "our enemies" are giving military religious training to their kids, so Christians have to out-fanaticize them.

When I think of a summer camp, I think of swimming and sports and archery and stuff, but nothing like that was shown in this documentary. The only scene that made this look anything like any summer camp I've ever seen is when some of the boys, (most of them were aged 10 to 12) were telling ghost stories in their cabin, until one of the couselors walked in and put a stop to it, because ghost stories are not "godly."

The main activity at this camp seemed to be the sermons, and the speaking in tongues. This documentary claims to be neutral, but it certainly does not put forth a flattering image of the Evangelical movement. There are a lot of scenes of young children spacing out, their eyes glazed over and faces quivering while they prayed. Many Christian groups and leaders, like Ted "I'm Straight Now, Honest" Haggard, who is featured in the movie, condemn the movie as anti-evangelical. However, the leader of this camp, and main focus of the movie, is Becky Fischer says she never felt exploited and has no problem with the movie. To any sane person of course, these people look like freaks. That the people who agreed to be in the documentary feel that this is the image they want to put out to the world is almost as disturbing as the image itself.

Becky Fischer is the kind of middle-aged trailer parkish kind of woman you'd see in the checkout line at Wal-Mart with a cart full of tubes of Pringles. She has a stupid haircut, (most of the people in this movie have really stupid looking haircuts) is hard to look at, and constantly has this bug-eyed look on her face like a lion eying a gazelle. Watching her spherical, turgid body sway around, ranting to a bunch of healthy looking kids like she's some kind of model of virtue for them to follow is especially off-putting and disturbing.

What disturbed me the most about how the parents in this film are bringing up their kids is the home-schooling. They teach them from creationist textbooks and emphasize to their kids that "science doesn't prove anything," and that evolution and global warming are all lies. At one point one of the kids says, "I think Galileo made the right choice to give up science for Christ." What the fuck!? Galileo? They never explicitly show these kids being taught that the sun revolves around the earth, but that's a disturbing implication that this might be the case.

The movie is framed with scenes of a liberal talk show host talking about the Evangelical movement and how dangerous is could become. At the end he interviews Becky Fischer and asks her what he thinks are the implications this kind of movement has for democracy. While paying lip-service to how she thinks democracy is the best system on earth, she says that since it allows everyone an equal voice "it will eventually destroy us."

The goals of the Evangelical movement are clear.