I just got done watching the most terrifying movie I have ever seen. It had nothing to do with psycho killers, fiendish monsters or global warming. On the contrary, “Jesus Camp” is about regular people—just like you and me—whose primary purpose in life is practicing their “prophetic gifts” so that they can “take back America for Christ.” I did not know that Jesus ever lived in the U.S.

Don’t get me wrong—Jesus is cool—but just like with every religion, fanatics tend to see things in a different light. Maybe it’s their gifts.

“Kids On Fire Summer Camp,” a Charismatic or Pentecostal Christian sanctuary located in North Dakota, teaches dedicated Evangelical kids to become soldiers in “God’s Army,” hell bent on spreading the word of the Lord, whatever the cost. Sounds to me like another group of fanatics in another god’s army.

But at least these other zealots have a clearly defined enemy: the Great Satan in the West. It appears that Jesus’s minions are at war with all of the Devil’s manifestations, including science, liberals and, of course, Britney Spears.

The film focuses on three children on the verge of adolescence who are involved in the Evangelical movement: Levi, Rachel and Victoria. Levi, a home-schooled, mullet-wearing self-proclaimed prophet, practices preaching in his father’s church, Rock of Ages, preparing himself for his destiny. Rachel, who attends Rock of Ages Church, prays over just about everything, including bowling balls, is a devoted follower whose mission includes handing-out religious fliers to everyone she meets. Victoria, or Tory, is a member of the children’s praise dance team at Christ Triumphant church and enjoys dancing to heavy-metal Christian music, although she feels uncomfortable about “dancing for the flesh,” whatever that means.

These kids scare me more than the Children of the Corn, I swear to God. They have been taught that their faith in Jesus and his teachings merits them certain gifts, such as “speaking in tongues” in a language even they can’t understand, as if the Holy Spirit itself were speaking through them. “He who walks behind the rows” spoke through his prophet Isaac, demanding the sacrifice of all the adults in Gatlin, Nebraska.

Becky Fischer, the spiritual director of the camp—as well as Kids in Ministry International—believes the children need to be in the vanguard of leading the rest of America along the path of righteousness toward conservative Christian values. She feels that Christians need to indoctrinate their own kids since the “enemy” is focused on indoctrinating their own. I’m not sure if the “enemy” she is referring to is MTV, baby-killing pro-choicers or common sense. Regardless who the “enemy” may be, Ms. Fischer’s army is armed to the teeth with prophesies, sermons and handouts, hell bent on kicking ass, taking names, and spreading the word of their god.

Several other preachers are involved in the indoctrination of the children, including Lou Engle, a leader of Harvest International Ministries. In once scene, Engle urges the children to help fight to put an end to abortion, leading them all in a prayer for George W. Bush to appoint “righteous judges” who will overturn Roe v. Wade. By the end of the sermon, all the children are chanting, “Righteous judges! Righteous judges!”

Another preacher, Ted Haggard, the renowned pastor of the New Life Christian Church in Colorado, became entangled in a scandal involving homosexual prostitution and meth less than two months after the release of “Jesus Camp.” Surprise, surprise.

But none of that craziness touched quite like a scene in which a woman announced that G. W. Bush himself had arrived at the church to visit the children. They all jumped up from their seats and ran hysterically toward the front of the church where a woman held a life-size, cardboard cut-out of the president himself. The children began holding out their hands and began “praying-on” Mr. Bush, as if they expected him to come to life at any moment and praise them in return.

Jesus.

What scares me isn’t the idea that Levi, like so many other Evangelicals, is home-schooled with a curriculum that conveniently adapts scientific fact to justify Creationism. What scares me isn’t the fact that these kids are taught that global warming is a hoax. What really scares me is that at the time of the last presidential elections, over 26% of the U.S. population identified itself as Evangelical Christian, a big enough percentage to swing any election when you take into consideration the number of non-evangelical conservatives in this country.

I’ve read dozens of books and seen dozens of movies that predict the future of the United States—and the world—and none of them shook me up like “Jesus Camp.” Some sort of virus turns everybody into flesh-eating zombies? Yeah, right. An asteroid is on a collision course with Earth? Oh well. An Evangelical Christian is a heart-beat away from the presidency! Not if I can help it!

When Sarah Palin was a child, her family joined the Wasilla Assembly of God, a Pentecostal church in the same town where she eventually became mayor. Most Evangelicals typically put their religious beliefs before all else, and to be quite honest, like our dear friend Matt Damon, someone who believes that dinosaurs roamed the earth at the same time that Adam and Eve were running around naked in the Garden of Eden has no place whatsoever as the head of the most well-armed military in the world. God forbid she convert the U.S. Marines into “Jesus’s Little Soldiers.”

If you’ve already seen “Jesus Camp,” then you know what I’m talking about; if you haven’t, I recommend that you do so immediately. Even if it scares you so much that you have to turn it off after 20 minutes or so, you deserve to know what kind of future you will face if we don’t do something about it. The DVD is available at both Blockbuster and Netflix.

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