[Buddha-l] Camp Jesus

[Richard Hayes]

Have any of you seen the movie "Camp Jesus"? Ma femme et moi saw it a few days 
ago. For those of you who don't know about it, it's a documentary about Becky 
Fischer, a Pentecostal minister who speaks in tongues and runs a charming 
little boot camp for Christian children. She admires the way Muslims have 
indoctrinated their young kids to grow up to be jihadis and figures what 
American Christians need is a corps of young men and women who will go to war 
against the enemies of Christianity (among whom she seems to count mostly 
social and political liberals).  

I'm not sure I would recommend the movie. For my taste, it's too heavy-handed 
and manipulative to be really effective as a documentary. It's not quite as 
ham-fisted as Michael Moore, but it's a far cry from the kind of balance one 
might get from Bill Moyers. On the other hand, just in case you still need to 
be convinced that there is a seriously fanatical lunatic fringe in the United 
States and that they literally worship George W. Bush, you might check it out 
of the library when it comes out on DVD. Meanwhile, take a look at Becky's 
website: http://kidsinministry.com/FIRECenter/index.html (Curt, I don't 
recommend that you see it; your virulent prejudices against Christianity are 
already out of control. This might put you over the edge.)

Is it time to start talking about Camp Buddha? Maybe we can get a bunch of 
impressionable kids marching around cardboard images of Leonard Cohen and 
shouting "War! War! War!" as a chunky camp director reminds them of all the 
enemies of the Sad-dharma out there in Evil Samsara. Or we could just give 
them all a Kalacakra initiation. The key is to get them fired up to declare 
war on all enemies of Lord Buddha before they develop the ghastly sick habit 
of thinking for themselves. (Or can we afford to think in a time of war?)

Richard
"My mule is sick. My horse is blind."

-- 
Richard P. Hayes
Department of Philosophy
University of New Mexico
http://www.unm.edu/~rhayes