Jesus Camp?

[ASHTEHCOMMIE]

While I was lying half awake waiting for the Advil to kick in last night so I could get a decent nights sleep I happened upon a movie that I had wanted to see for sometime; regretfully I fell asleep during it, but for the most part that I saw I was literately shocked and horrified that places like this do exist.

For those of you not familiar with the movie its about hardcore bible thumpers brainwashing children into believing what they do.
When you see the children getting right into it and crying and such its really upsetting.
Has anyone seen this movie?
does anyone know people like this?
Where I'm from people aren't overly religious, but I want to hear about your real life encounters.

[KaosKinesis]

I don't have enough time to go in-depth about this, but I'll try a bit anyway.

I'll start of by saying I'm Agnostic. I find it sick and wrong that a Religion has the nerve to say if you don't believe in what we say, you're doomed to eternal hellfire. A "true" god would not judge people because of this; rather, their actions and what they did during their life.

I have never been a big fan of Christianity because for the most part it is a joke. The majority of the "Christian" organizations/charities, etc are chain-linked to their founders pockets. I can't stand it when I see a little kid get over-emotional about something he hasn't had the chance to think out properly. The sad thing is, once a child is raised in such an environment - they will most likely think that way for the rest of their lives. I was born and raised Catholic, and I've seen most of what the world truely is. Much of that makes me question not only people, but whom they serve as well. I believe their is some form of Higher Power, yes...but I honestly don't believe it's a "Good" one.

There's some silly little facts I like to throw out there.

-In the Bible God has killed 60million people. Satan has killed 10.

-The story of Lilith was omitted form the Bible because of controversy. Lilith was Adam's first wife. God made her so that Adam no longer had to sex up the animals. Lilith put up a fight with adam and refused to lay beneath him always. Thus, Lilith left and "God" made a more submissive woman. (Eve.). This is the base story of Lilith.

-The Bible supports genocide, etc.

Most Christian Fundamentalists I've had arguments with tend to ignore any points I ever make linking Christianity to the thousands of years old Egyptian religions. What a lot of people don't realise, is that Christianity is not original, nor is it unique. Every story ever written in the Bible has been stolen from history. Every name, date, etc...was taken from texts and spoken words long before Christianity was around. Such as the fact most every other God in other/older religions was born on December 25th, performed miracles, died and rose again on the 3rd day, etc...

I say let a person believe whatever they wish to, as long as it makes them a better person.

[ASHTEHCOMMIE]

that was very informative kaos; I'm also agnostic; my family is Cristian as well as my boyfriend to the extent that we have a cross on our wall. I think that its a sick how they brainwash the kids in such a cult like fashion; have you seen this movie? definitely the scariest thing I have seen this year and I MAKE horror films!

[KaosKinesis]

I don't think I've seen it, what's it called?

[ASHTEHCOMMIE]

jesus camp

look it up on imdb.com it got a good rating i might rent it again just to see it all.

[KaosKinesis]

Footage from inside the camp shows young children weeping and wailing as they promise to stop their sinning. Child after child is driven to tears.

Wouldn't that be the definition of child abuse?

[ASHTEHCOMMIE]

Oh I know eh? these kids are like really crying too, it hurts your heart to watch.

[Fortunato]

I've heard of those sorts of places for the "cure gay" camps, and know that they also supposedly "cure" drug dependencies, alcoholism, and probably "liberal bias" or whatever. I'unno; I'm about as anti-religious as you can get. I think that established religion is a joke, that most religion folks are hypocrites who like to pick and choose which parts of their faith they follow, and that the ones who follow every part of their faith are generally disgusting, bigoted, red-neck freaks.

As someone who was raised Lutheran, I think it's pretty sick to teach religion to little kids period. I mean, I was sane enough to take a step back and question my faith, mostly due to circumstances. Most kids aren't. The fact of the matter is that if you tell a kid to believe something from when they're young, they'll keep believing it when they're an adult no matter how stupid it sounds.

If I were to raise my child to think that red was blue and blue was red, they would never be convinced otherwise. And most people would probably think that they were stupid for it. And yet, raising my kid to believe that there's a mystical being who created everything around us and punishes us for not believing in it, but at the same time allows us to suffer from disease, hunger, and war, is normal?

Honestly, most religion (especially Christianity) is asking you to believe in the most extreme thing. A metaphor to help me illustrate this:

Suppose that someone is pointing a gun at me. I have a few options here.

1) I can believe that the bullet will tear through my fragile body and kill me, and thus jump out of the way.

2) I can believe that Boogalaboo the Mighty Spirit will rip a hole in the ground and rise up, protecting me from the bullet and punishing my worldly foes.

Which is more rational? Obviously, option 1.

So now with religion.

I can choose:

1) ...to believe that when I die, it's over and I'm gone. Therefore, I can live my life to the fullest and make the most of my time spent living.

2) ...to believe that an all powerful god created everything, and that when I die my spirit will come out of my body and either rise up to heaven to go down to a hell of eternal torture, and thus spend my life fearing this god and worshiping him rather than enjoying my life.

Which is more rational?

[MAFisinthehouse]

I don't think Jesus exists...