Training Tiny Troops For Christ
 Summer Bible
Camp Indoctrinated Children
November 24, 2006
By SUSAN DUNNE, Courant
Staff Writer
A lot has happened since the
documentary "Jesus Camp" made its world premiere in April at the
Tribeca Film Festival. Becky Fischer, the director of the
evangelical Christian summer camp shown in the movie, has closed the
camp under pressure. The camp's most prominent supporter, Ted
Haggard, is no longer president of the National Association of
Evangelicals, after a scandal involving a male prostitute and
crystal meth.
One hears these news stories and feels relief on behalf of the
children shown in Heidi Ewing and Rachel Grady's documentary,
opening today at Real Art Ways. These kids should spend their
summers playing, or at least mowing lawns for spare cash, instead of
at Fischer's camp being trained to be pawns in a game they aren't
old enough to understand. To watch them being used in this way is
very sad.
"Jesus Camp," which last week was short-listed for the best
feature-length documentary Oscar, follows Fischer, a Missouri
preacher, as she recruits kids and their families to her "Kids on
Fire" camp, where they are indoctrinated in radical Christianity,
and also in radical conservative politics disguised as Christianity.
Fischer considers herself a steadfast soldier for Christ. But her
true calling is being a killer saleswoman, zeroing in on the brains
of these impressionable tots with the swift precision of a Disney
Channel programmer.
Fischer is also a hypocrite. In the film, she and her helpers
contradict almost every dictate they preach. Adults can figure this
out. Kids, who don't know better and are taught to respect their
elders, can't.
She rails against the power of evil on impressionable minds, and
then she messes around with her campers' unformed psyches. She asks
God to "open the hearts" of her campers, and then proceeds to close
their hearts. She scares children so much she makes them cry, then
comforts them as they weep. She speaks out against abortion, then
exploits the children whose lives she claims to revere. She shouts
out her devout Christianity, then leads her charges in a shocking
act of idolatry: praying before a cardboard cutout of President
Bush.
Then there is Haggard. He jokingly threatens his congregation with
"I think I know what you did last night. If you send me $1,000, I
won't tell your wife." Of course, somebody finally told his wife
(and the media) what he did last night, and now he is a much more
famous man than he ever was.
The directors stumbled by including the testimony of only the most
indoctrinated children, the most off-putting. What about those kids
at the camp who, when things hit a fever pitch, look confused,
frightened, out of sorts? What are they thinking? Ewing and Grady
didn't ask them. They should have.
But they should be praised for featuring progressive Christian radio
host Mike Papantonio, because Gospel-believing liberals are the last
people whose existence the religious right wants to acknowledge.
Just by showing up, they demolish the foundation of the radical
fringe's ideology - that the left is Godless - and they offer viable
role models for voters whose faith is important to them.
Papantonio's strong values stand in healthy contrast to the
fanaticism of Fischer, who is now contemplating her next evangelical
venture, some new way to fill innocent ears with her own warped
perceptions and call it the word from heaven.
JESUS CAMP is a Magnolia Pictures release produced and directed by
Heidi Ewing and Rachel Grady. Running time: 87 minutes. Rated PG-13
for discussions of mature subject matter. Opening today at Real Art
Ways.
Contact Susan Dunne at sdunne@courant.com
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