Oscar-Nominated Jesus Camp's Leading Lady Speaks

I'd like to start by saying that i have a great respect for the religions of the world, it's important to recognize this because people of all faiths, and in this case "Christians" do an enormous amount of charity and humanitarian work in the world, relieving suffering, misery, oppression and so forth.

As individuals whether we are religious or not, we experience problems and suffering, we have delusions such as attachment, anger, ignorance, therefore our actions often bring about the very things we don't like.

It is important to have some belief or faith that an improvement in our human condition exists, one that is beyond the day-to-day activities of food, clothing and instant gratification. If no faith exists, then we will not have the courage to explore the causes which can bring about our future happiness.

We can all agree that a blind faith can be dangerous. Why is it dangerous? Because it is without a strong foundation. Blind faith is easily disturbed, supported primarily by desire and emotion - which is not necessarily bad, but it is not unshakable, because questions like "Why?" can easily disturb or spot fallacies in reasoning.

So that's not an argument against faith, or belief - rather it is saying, as human beings with a faculty of great intelligence, we should support our faith and belief with reasoning. Not necessarily - science and instruments, because they have their limitations too - but internal logical reasoning.

We have to look to the best of our ability, what kind of effect our actions have, what is our motivation doing this?

We have to check, and double-check - if our strong faith comes from a sense of ego, selfishness - then we have to re-tool it. But only we can check, only we can know if our actions do good or harm.

Therefore, that is the main fallacy of blind faith, is that it comes from the outside. It is a force that is usually impressed upon us by an external agent, such as a friend or whomever. Then comes belief, but that belief is only supported by external factors, like a certain environment or entourage.

If this particular person is placed in another environment, their faith will quickly change, due to a lack of internal basis.

So overall, i'm not one to judge, Jesus camp might have the best of intentions - but children are too young or not trained to apply some basis of reasoning, they are easily impressionable and therefore emulate those around them.

At a later date, these same 'devout' children grow up in people who lose all faith in religion, faith in others and spiritual people.

That is a great danger and it happens in all religions, all faiths. So just by looking at events within our own society we can observe by analogy that faith inspired solely by circumstance, environment, personality or emotion can often have the totally opposite effect at a later date.

Spiritual teachers should be skillful, having subdued their own internal negative emotions. Instead of declaring something is bad, explain why in relevant terms, it can be harmful.

We should take into account that every child, teenager, adult has different dispositions towards spiritually, at different ages.

Doing the opposite is highly irresponsible, and might indicate a greater regard for our own desires, rather than what's good for others.

Hi heather, thanks for the kind words.

I grew up in a mish-mash environment, i went to catholic school for a while, my parents are buddhist, and later on in life i was baptized, and now I study Buddhism.

Oddly enough after a circuitous journey i feel like i have an appreciation for all faiths i've encountered, as well as the person who has no faith. I consider myself more of a secular person than anything - i think all the great spiritual people in history have never called themselves anything, but just did good things for others.

HH the Dalai Lama says i'm just a simple monk, Mother Theresa never proselytized, Albert Einstein had very deep insights into the nature of reality while being a "scientist", and course Jesus Christ never said i'm christian!

There's the big trap in my opinion, form, ideas, concepts without internalizing them, without developing some direct experience. Things will always then remain, me and them, your idea vs my idea, my group vs your group.

But i agree with you that there is something larger than us, and that non-conceptual reality is beyond form, and conceptual thought and words. However, because we're all still stuck in form, everything still appears as something "good" or "bad" even though in reality, things don't actually exist in that way.

Just like the secular person rejects the notion of a particular religion being the one truth, the religious person rejects the notion of there being a truth other than their own! But who is right? I think, neither is, there is no conclusion, just two different points of views who grasp at reality to the best of their ability.

Of course it's really unfortunate that some individuals, and that's what religion is really, a group of people who force their ideas on others. I think that's really wrong, because as you said, in the long run it creates a lot of conflict.

Anyhow, of all people, i just have opinions myself and my own perspective, my own projections - and we can notice how getting into discussions can land us into hot water too!

So I think it's so important for people to think for themselves, to have that freedom to choose whatever they want. Like you mentioned that's what's scary about this, is if you scare someone you take away that ability to reason - i guess in the end, that's all we ask is that we're all given that chance.