"Raise your hand if you think that God can do anything!"

Pastor Becky Fischer throws her arm into the air as an example while darting her eyes back and forth over the children in the audience. She yells in a fake high-pitched voice like a sleazy, overly animated kid's show host and waits for them to imitate her answer. In one aisle a mother lifts the arm of her disinterested son, no more than 8 years old.

That, in a nutshell, is the whole problem.

I almost walked out of Jesus Camp during several scenes; it was that hard to watch. As I listened to conversations around the theatre before the film, I was pleased to find myself in a fairly secular group. Not much of a surprise, considering we're in Hollywood. I stopped and wondered how the opening nights were in fundamentalist Christian towns such as Colorado Springs, Colorado.

Jesus Camp is a straightforward documentary, with no narrator or fancy cutting to present an opinion. The footage really does speak for itself. The film follows a group of children born into Evangelical Christian families as they prepare for and later attend the "Kid's on Fire" camp in Devil's Lake (I'm not making this up), North Dakota.

We meet a young boy in an oversized t-shirt who is lounging in front of the television at home. He's watching a "Creation Adventures" video for children, and with a commanding baritone voice it falsely instructs that the earth was formed 6,000 years ago by you-guessed-who. Thankfully, in my theatre this received a roaring round of laughter. The narrator makes a joke about how 'some people say' we came from 'slime,' and he puts on a ridiculous face as he holds up his two hands covered in a silly green goop. We later see this boy's mother looking through a 3-ring study binder at the dinner table, quizzing her son on what to say if someone tries to tell him that global warming is real(?!?). He knows the answer to this one, and with a smile tells his mother how he would reply: the temperature has only risen half a degree over some recent time period, and that this isn't a big deal. It was as if he was doing his nightly homework, with his mother at his side. I sort of missed what the boy specifically said. I had already blown a gasket and was yelling at the screen after the ridiculous global warming question the mother had asked - And from some 3-ring study binder no less!

Later we meet another camp attendee, a little girl who loves dancing. She is ashamed of when she sometimes dances "for the flesh" and has to correct herself, because everything she does must be for God.

At the church we see Pastor Becky Fischer in action with two boys (one was the boy watching the "Creation Adventures" video), recruiting them for the camp in the hallway with phrases such as "Right on, guys!" and "Totally cool!" Pastor Becky asks the boys if they plan on going to the camp, and they are. She tries out some other young trendy phrases in a high, affected voice, and gives them both a hug. Watching this I found myself growling out loud with anger like a dog after the mailman. My friend began elbowing me to keep it down.

Before camp begins, there is the blessing of the empty chairs, the electricity, and a PowerPoint presentation. It was much-needed comic relief, and my theatre laughed together for a moment.

The camp begins and it is pure madness. One of the first points of business is to condemn every child's favorite "warlock". Pastor Becky explains that "had he been in the Old Testament, Harry Potter would have been put to death!" (Thank goodness we've got that straightened out).

The children are all so eager to please, and this element of the film is the most difficult for me. If the adults decided to hand out the special Kool-Aid at this camp, the children would all unquestionably partake. With arms in the air, they are 'instructed' on how to let the spirit take over their bodies and speak in tongues. The children imitate. Many of them cry. Some fall to the ground and shake on the floor in what looks like an epileptic seizure. More cry. I wanted to cry with them, or more accurately for them. This all looked very unhealthy, I could only imagine what it was doing to them psychologically. I had the striking thought that this was all completely unforgivable. These adults, no matter their intentions, were performing horrific acts of mental child abuse.

Then comes the guilt, and mountains of it. "A lot of you say you're Christians, but how many of you are leading two separate lives?" Pastor Becky lays it on thick over the PA. She leads the children on through ideas of what they might be sinfully doing at school with their friends, and how they should be ashamed of themselves for it. I considered vomiting into my drink cup. She asks the children to gather around her and reach out their hands if they wish to be cleansed of these newly uncovered sins. Their cleansing source: A 20 oz. bottle of Nestlé-brand water poured over their grouped hands. Talk about product placement! There is of course more crying. There is more of me yelling at the screen, and more of my friend elbowing me in embarrassment.

They bring in a life-size cardboard cutout of President Bush in front of a big American flag, and the children are instructed to bless him and speak in tongues for him (or perhaps at him, I'm not exactly sure how this is supposed to work). Everyone performs as directed.

Suddenly, I was shocked to find a sense of relief wash over me. "Don't worry," I thought, "This is all a dream that you've had before! This is the one where the crazy Christians are with you on an airplane that is about to crash, and then Natalie Portman tells you-" No, wait, this is really happening! Can it possibly be?

A 'Pro-Life' speaker visits the camp and explains how "God doesn't care about how small the baby is, it is still a person and a soul, even if it's just protoplasm..." he pauses to pan the young crowd with a cartoon-ish, bug-eyed smile before delivering his punch line: "...whatever that is!" Some in the theatre laughed, and some screamed. Things had become so unbelievable that the audience was just making whatever sounds were possible in their collective state of shock. The 'Pro-Life' man passed around a boxed set of plastic fetuses at different stages of development (do they sell these at Christian Supply stores?!). He then placed red gaffe tape with the word 'LIFE' written on it over each child's mouth in preparation for their protest in front of the US Capitol Building. I had to step back for a second. They are placing gaffe tape over a child's mouth, and the child is then persuaded to interpret this as a positive, meaningful experience. 'Let the church decide what goes in place of my personal thoughts and voice.' It's a sad metaphor for how these children are kept from thinking for themselves, and a sad irony how their 'LIFE', the only one they'll ever have, is truly what they are missing out on by accepting these dogmatic restrictions.

The sermons are rife with politics, and Pastor Becky leads the children in chilling chants such as "One nation under God!" and "Righteous Judges!" She preaches of war and the mission for their "key generation." She asks if they would lay down their lives for Jesus, and I'm sure you can imagine the children's eager response. As Pastor Becky later explains to the interviewer,



No need to decipher her statements, no need for clever video cuts to accentuate the parallels. She spells it out for everyone, and it's jaw droppingly crystal clear through a megaphone. Let's call it religious fundamentalism, Coke and Pepsi.

The film even makes a quick visit to Ted Haggard's New Life Church in Colorado Springs, Colorado, just in case you were able to keep your lunch down this far into the film. In his sequel appearance to 'The Root of All Evil?' Ted is as creepy as ever, speaking directly to the camera as they attempt to film one of his mega-sermons. "If you try and use any of this I'll sue you!" he says perhaps half-jokingly, followed by an expected laugh from his flock. Ted even gets in his little sound byte about some people 'calling children animals.' He yelled this same phrase at Dawkins and his film crew in 'The Root of All Evil?' while chasing them away from the church in his pickup truck, and I wondered how frequently he replays that confrontation over in his mind.

'Jesus Camp' speaks without commentary like an ice pick to the heart and mind. In the United States we are in the presence of a dangerous and powerful Evangelical Christian movement that runs from local churches all the way to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. Unless a person is steeped in such fundamentalism, I think viewers will come away from 'Jesus Camp' with an extreme sense of urgency for rational organization and action against this spreading virus. Maybe the film can shed light on the horrible indoctrination of these poor children. Some of them will escape their parent's religion, but too many will stay to repeat the memetic cycle with another generation of eager and impressionable young boys and girls.

We can always walk out of the movie theatre, but Ted Haggard, Becky Fisher, President Bush and millions of Evangelicals will be waiting for us in the real world, and how we handle their rising brand of fundamentalism will likely shape our nation and the world for generations to come.

Watch the trailer on apple.com

Visit the official 'Jesus Camp: The Movie' website

View the list of theatres showing 'Jesus Camp'

YouTube.com clips of 'Jesus Camp'