It is not the will of your Father...

I literally have five drafts of unfinished blogs in my little Blogger organizer thingy, but when I was be-bopping through the web this morning and came across this (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7UWIb4FwHPg) in Tertia's blog, my head exploded. After cleaning up bits of brain and unwashed hair, I decided that I just wasn't in the mood for a bittersweet little piece about Autumn, or a humorous bit about being a female Dawg fan. Oh, no. I am in full-out Pissed Off Agnostic mode.

In case you're wondering, at this point in time, I've gotten off of the Christian Highway. That's not to say I won't get back on at some point in time. It's just that I realized that it was cluttered with a whole lot of Mack Trucks for the Lord that want to run me over and as I prefer to muse and ponder and look at my road map while driving (dangerous, I know, although one assumes that some spiritual Navigator will alert one if a giant pothole of Evil is impending), it seemed best to take the ramp toward the Pantheistic Rest Stop. Wow. I can't decide it that is the worst metaphor ever or a brilliant piece of prose that I need to bookmark for further exploration. Huh. I think I'll just eat a Pop-Tart.

In any case, I should make it clear that, like John S. Hall, I think Jesus was way cool. However, I'm not sure what Jesus would have to say about a bunch of pre-adolescents hopping around a room in camo with what appear to be swords, crying because they have fallen away from the Lord (although it's okay, because some woman will sprinkle their hands with Dannon water {New slogan: We'll hydrate you AND wash away your sins!} and their souls will be clean again), doing what appears to be bowing down to a cardboard cutout of President Bush (can I get a "What the Fuck?"), and speaking nonchalantly about people giving up their lives for God. I'm thinking, based on the reading I've done this morning from my big ol' study Bible, that Jesus would be all, "Oh, no, she DI-INT!" and would throw the cardboard cutout of W across the room. One assumes that since his daddy's envoy Moses scrapped the first set of rules laid out for the Jews because they were worshipping a golden calf, a cardboard cutout would REALLY piss him off, particularly as it seemed to be being worshipped by a bunch of little kids.

I should further make it clear that I have not seen the actual documentary "Jesus Camp," only the rather incendiary clip from ABC found above. You know. The one that made my head explode. I'm not sure what actually lit the fuse: it could be the little pre-menarchal girl about to have a stroke over abortion, it could have been the little boy in agony over the state of his eight-year-old soul. The group of kids lying on the floor reaching hands out to the aforementioned cardboard cutout got me worked up, as well. But I think the part that really caused my cranial discombobulation was the one where Becky Fischer, who runs the camp in question said, "I want to see them [the children at her camp, one assumes] as radically laying down their lives for the Gospel as they are over in Pakistan and Israel and Palestine and all those different places." Ahem. Now, I suppose that by saying "they", Ms. Fischer could be referring to the men and women and children who attend the mosques and temples and churches of their choice despite the fact that doing so might cause their death by any of the factions that hate them because of where they worship. However, given that at one point in time in the (incendiary) clip, Ms. Fischer is shown throwing her head back and saying with clenched fists, "This means war" and that right after the layingdowntheirlives clip a little girl says, "We're kind of being trained to be warriors. Only in a much FUNNER way"... Ahem part deux. No, I rather think that Ms. Fischer, when saying "they", is referring to the folks who first sling stones, then bullets, then bombs, then airplanes at the enemies of their god. You know, the people we refer to as "terrorists." You know, the ones we call fanatics because they've found certain bits in their holy books that seem to say, "Go put a flaming smackdown to those folks who don't worship *insert god of choice here*.

TO BE FAIR: Ms. Fischer does rebut the ABC story here: http://kidsinministry.com/ and speaks to a few more of my concerns, citing scripture several times. You know what? Whatever, Ms. Fischer. I watched your mouth say the shit above and while I read the part where you say Christian warfare is one of the spirit, all I could see in my head was the camo and face painting and my head exploded and now I'm pissed and, quite frankly, a little afraid of you and your Kamikaze Kids for Christ.

When I teach my son about God and Christianity, I want to focus on the Jesus who said in Matthew (18:14, if you want to know) "...It is not the will of your Father which is in heaven, that one of these little ones should perish." Children, according to Jesus, are supposed to be loved and protected. They aren't supposed to be warriors. That's an adult job. How DARE Becky Fischer take a way cool guy like Jesus and turn him into a recruiting officer? How dare she make a little girl feel bad because sometimes when she dances, she isn't dancing for the Lord?

I'm worried that the children who are being fed this crap without proper guidance are going to be the same sort of people who walk onto crowded buses with dynamite strapped to their chests. And I might be riding one of those buses someday. Or Jeffrey might.

So I'm getting off the bus. Too many crazies on there. And given that Jeffrey keeps asking me what happens when we "start over after we get old", I'm thinking I need to go a few miles on my Bike of Buddhism, anyway.