How To Raise a Jesus-Loving Child (While Scaring the Rest of the Civilized World Witless in the Process)

Kids! I don't know what's wrong with these kids today....

With their long hair, and their rock and roll music, and their cell phones and dvds and ipods. And their books. And their public schools. They're just doomed for the hot place. Well, most of them are. However, a select few have been chosen to lead the path for us all to Heaven, and aren't they lucky.

Mr M and I watched a documentary this weekend called "Jesus Camp." Well, I watched it. He got very twitchy and rose upwards and downwards and rambled through all the rooms of his house, warning me he'd be doing this throughout the entire movie because he couldn't stand to see all of what was taking place before him. But you know me. I sat and watched, just like a highway gooner watches a car wreck, because I just had to see the gore. And I don't mean Al. Al was nowhere near the general vicinity of this film.

"Jesus Camp" tells the story of a lady, well, she's a woman, I'm not so sure about the lady part, named Becky Fischer. Becky runs a camp for kids, and it's called the "Kids on Fire" Camp, which should be enough to keep any kid from wanting to go to it, but apparently that's not so much the case. ("Awww, Mom, can't I go to baseball camp? I don't wanna get set on fire!") See, Becky knows what's going on in the world. She's seen all these "militant" religions in the Middle East indoctrinating their kids to be warriors for their Gods, and she doesn't like that. So she's gonna by God get some kids on the Christian Warpath. And so she's set up this camp, this Boot Camp for the Lord.

So we see Becky tell her story (where she says that she wants to have every liberal out there "shaking in their boots"), then we meet some kids who are born into Evangelical Christian families, and then we see them all congregate to get set on fire. We meet kids like Levi (nice Jewish name, Levi), who already writes his own sermons and sports a killer rat-tail mullet the likes of which haven't been seen since 1987. And Tori, who likes to dance to Christian Death Metal music, but says she's working really hard at being able to "dance for the Lord instead of dancing for the flesh." And Rachael, a sad little creature who picks out random strangers and gives them literature, saying, "God told me He wants to love on you," and thinks that the best way she could possibly spread The Word is to be a manicurist when she grows up, fixing nails and preaching the gospel to her manicurees.

(By the way, these kids - it's not their fault. You try so hard to find fault with them because they're proselytizing robots, but one wonders about what might have been. Levi has a nice smile and is outgoing, and might be a likeable kid if not for the constant preaching, the slack jaw, and the thought-repellant haircut. Rachael is a lost lamb, friendly to a fault, and one wonders what will happen to her when she picks the wrong stranger to tell, "God told me He wants to love on you." Tori, on the other hand, is as dumb as a post, and one wonders how soon she'll get pregnant and be forced into a wedding with the teenaged father. Better start dancing for the Lord soon, Tori.)

So it's easy to say this camp is a seriously literal case of preaching to the converted, but those are just the kids they focus on. There are scads more little rascals waiting to be set aflame at Becky's camp, and through this documentary we see her work her wonders. And based on this, I'm going to tell you how you too can have your very own Kid on Fire. Providing of course you have a kid, and if you don't, what are you waiting for? God needs more troops for His army!

Don't be afraid to volunteer: The very first session at the Camp O' Fire, Becky starts asking kids if they're ready to be martyrs. If they're ready to die for Jesus. Ones in the know, of course, pop their hands right up like they studied all night for the answer. A few look around, with faces perplexed as if to say, "Die? We have to die?" before slowly lifting a hand. Then there are those kids so small they have no idea what Ms Becky is even talking about, I mean, kids four and five years old sitting on their mommies' laps wondering when Cookie Time is, and so in those cases, the moms take hold of their babies' hands and raise them up. Yes, don't be afraid to volunteer your four year old for martyrdom, please. They'll learn what it means one day.

Study the Nazis: It didn't take long for the sentence to come rolling out of my mouth and to Mr M. "This movie would be great on a double bill with 'Triumph of the Will.'" For certainly Becky has studied her share of Hitler Hints re getting the young ones on the right track. Also in that very first camp session, Becky gathers the kids around and tells them this little nugget. "Somebody told me that some of you don't practice your faith outside of church. That when you're with your friends you cuss and lie, and this makes you phonies and hypocrites." She needles and needles until the kids start crying, I mean, bawling out of fear, then she starts inviting kids to come forward and wash their hands in the holy water that will set them free. Which, oddly enough, comes in plastic 16.9 oz bottles, with labels marked "Nestle." I'm not making that up. In her opening speech, Becky promises us she can go onto any playground and within 10 minutes she'll have every kid there ready to give up his life for the Lord. Somehow, I believe this. I'd do it in five, if only to get her to stop ragging on me and let me play on the jungle gym a little longer. "Somebody told me." Jesus Christ, no pun intended.

Use really good props: Later in the movie, Ms Fischer shows us some of her camp supplies. Teaching aids, if you will. They include a Barbie and Ken, with plastic leaves attached to their nether regions, to be Adam and Eve. One can only wonder what will happen when those leaves fall off. I wonder if she tries to make them have clunky, plastic sex, like we used to do with our dolls. It's not easy, especially seeing as how Ken has no penis to speak of. She also has, sold in the Archie McPhee catalog, no less, and I know this because I've bought them, gelatin molds shaped like brains. At camp, these go in conjunction with some little gooey rubber hands on elastic strings, which are meant to represent sin. Because we all know sin has four fingers. When the gelatin molds are filled and the kids have some jiggly brains before them, Becky slaps them with the gooey hands to show the youngsters how sin sticks to the brain. Unfortunately, with these hands, sin also sticks to the table, the wall, itself, and everything else. Boy, that sin sure is a nuisance.

For God's sake, homeschool your kids: It's no secret that homeschooling is big in the Evangelical world. This is because our government, our separation of church and state government, has seen fit to take God out of the schools. We see several of these kids at home, being taught by their parents, having long discussions about how global warming is a myth perpetrated by the liberals to make people disbelieve God's word. Explain this one to me, because I've been thinking about it ever since I saw the movie, and I still don't get it. These people really hate the idea of global warming, for some reason. I'm no scholar, but doesn't that kind of say to you, "Love God, have no respect whatsoever for His creation, the earth?" Also, Tongues can be considered the homeschool educational equivalent of a foreign language. These kids spoke in tongues more times than I've had hot dinners. Not sure about verb conjugation, but they seemed to be quite good at it.


Get with the program, or prepare to disappear: Becky Fischer and her ilk are certainly no fans of poor Harry Potter's. "Harry Potter and his friends are witches and warlocks, and in biblical times they would have been killed!" Later, at dinner, some kids are sitting around a table, and a poor kid with wire glasses and brown hair is pointed out to Becky and told, "Doesn't he look like Harry Potter?" Another kid says to his buddies, "My mom won't let me watch the Harry Potter movies." Then laughs. "But I go to my dad's and watch them there." Neither kid is seen again at Kids O' Fire camp. (Wouldn't it be hilarious if the final installment of the Potter books, soon to be released, would have Harry and his friends stoned to death by the public at large for having magical powers? These kids will have missed the best book-reading opportunity of their young lives!) (And by the way, warlocks would have been killed in biblical times. OK. That's um, that's kind of like, um, murder, isn't it?)

God fixes EVERYTHING: Now, I'll readily admit that I've been known to pray on occasion, but lil' ol' me, I like to stick to the big things. "Please comfort my grandmother with her Parkinson's disease." "Now that I've lost the steering wheel of the podmobile and am sitting in high-speed traffic, please keep those tractor trailers in the right lane. Thanks, sorry to bother." Ever wonder why so many prayers go unanswered? Because these hoo-hahs are clogging God's ears praying for everything in sight. Little Rachael prays while bowling. With every throw. "Oh, God, please bless this ball and make it go straight down the alley." And Becky and her minions roam the hall before camp begins, praying over every fucking thing in the room. "Oh, God, we pray over these seats that they'll be filled tonight, we pray over the projector and the Power Point presentation, we pray over these microphones that they'll work, God, we pray that there will be no lightning storms that will knock out the electricity tonight." I mean, forgive me, but if a bolt of lightning comes out of the sky and knocks out your microphone? I think God might be trying to tell you something.

Be sure to let suspect-looking men touch around on your kids and tell them about abortion: There's some dude at the Fire Camp, with a raspy voice and a bushy mustache, who comes out one night in a red t-shirt emblazoned with the legend "LIFE," and he starts telling kids all about abortion. I know times have changed, but I was probably about 14 before I even knew what abortion was, and here he is telling four year olds, six year olds, nine year olds about it. He works them up into a frenzy and gets them all bawling again, then proceeds to pull out his own little props. Pieces of red duct tape, each saying "LIFE" in black letters on them, which he then sticks across the kids' mouths. And that makes crying rather painful, I'd say. I noticed he didn't do this to himself, because apparently the pain of duct tape over a bushy mustache isn't worth stopping abortion for. And speaking of which....

Get the tears going: If being in the bosom of the Lord is so much fun, then why are all these kids crying so much? Every time Becky starts in on them about one kind of sin or other, the tears start. Uncontrollable weeping and sobbing. Wailing. Mr M, ever the psychologist, said the kids had no idea on earth why they were crying, it was an emotional response to the situation. And you know what? He's absolutely right. (Cherish that, Mr M, for it doesn't come often.)

Don't go to a dead church: Yes, apparently some churches have been declared DOA. According to the campers, these are the churches where people sit quietly on their pews and say, "We worship you, we worship you." As little Rachael tells us, Jesus will not go to these churches. He will only go to churches where people jump up and down, scream, and shout, "Hallelujah!" Apparently, Jesus has an endless supply of Excedrin.

Buy a life-sized cardboard cut-out of George W Bush for your home: Because W is anointed by God to rule our nation. One night at camp, Fischer brings out such a cut-out, and tells kids the Godly wonder of Bush. She has the kids come up to the cut-out and lay hands on it, and pray on it. Which, hey, I got no problems whatsoever with people praying for George Bush. Pray that the man suddenly develops a brain, or some morals, or some scruples, or decides to disassociate himself with all the criminal-element cronies he loves so well. But Becky can lean on me all day (keeping me from the jungle gym I love so much) and not convince me that this alcoholic crook who's sent nearly 5000 men to die overseas for no reason is a man of God. Sorry, Becky. Not gonna win that one. However, while we're at it again....

Remember that you're living in God's country: Having not read my Bible cover-to-cover, I guess it's no surprise that I missed the part where God held His earth in one hand, scanned it with the index finger of the other one, pointed to North America, and said, "Ahhh, there it is. This part's mine." If I had a dollar for every time I heard someone in "Jesus Camp" proclaim, "America is God's country, and we're taking it back for God," I'd be a rich woman. Or at least be able to have dinner out at a nice restaurant, complete with a few martinis. I mean, you have your Bethlehem, your Jerusalem, your Vatican City, and yet America is God's. If you're a true believer, wouldn't all countries be God's? Nope, our great land, our melting pot of democracy and diversity and people of all creeds living in peace and harmony, is God's country. So you other creeds better beat it, and pronto.

You know, this has already turned into a hefty blog, and yet there's still so much more I could say about Becky Fischer and her fiery camp. Things like "child abuse." Things like, "I wish they'd do a sequel, a la the 7-Up Series, to show us where these kids end up." One can only pray that when they hit their teen years they get to see enough of the real world to realize what they've been led into. I don't know, though. I fear they'll never see a world outside their front doors, or the big church at Fire Camp. De-frocked meth addict/male prostitue-patronizing evangelist Ted Haggard appears briefly in the documentary, in all his sleazy glory, giving some (embarrassingly condescending) preaching advice to rat-tailed Levi and his brother. I found myself wondering if these kids even know of his indiscretions, or if it's all been shielded from them by their parents.

So, yes, I'm a highway gooner, and I had to watch this car wreck. It was sad, it was funny. Then again, it was about this time last year I was blogging with laughter over a paranoid schizophrenic who got eaten by a bear.

But even if you're not a highway gooner, I'd advise you to watch this movie. Because along with being sad and funny, it was also scary. It was fucking scary. So when you watch it, it's OK to giggle. Just as long as you remember that in the 30s, people were so busy giggling at the funny men goosestepping through their towns that they forgot to do anything about it.

Betland's Olympic Update:
* Acrowinners, we have acrowinners! So, what did the marching band form on the field?
- Honorable Mentions go to LilyG, with her "Stoned, gasping Federline," and Kellie, with her "Striking Grand Flag."
- Runner-Up goes to Flipsy, with her "Single gay female."
- And this week's winner goes to DeepFatFriar, with his "Sexy gorgeous floozy."
- Thanks to all who played. You've all done very well!