All language subtitles for Shiny.Happy.People.S02E02.720p.HEVC.x265-MeGusta[EZTVx.to].en

Looking at
this honor ring now,

I think about how excited I was

when I was being told that I was
going to get a piece of "honor".

And I remember thinking,

"This is probably going to be the best
decision that I've made in my life."

We had a saying, "It was
the ring, the line, the plan."

So this is the ring.

And the line was the individuals
that were in this group.

And the plan, which is
to go out into the world

and make disciples and lead
a generation to Christ.

But I actually wore
it for like ten years

because it really did mean
something significant to me.

It's like my entire life is just
encapsulated in this little thing.

Here it is, my precious.

Right after you go to the Honor
Academy, you receive your honor ring.

When you receive your honor ring,
you pledge loyalty for life.

I received the privilege of
wearing the ring. The ring!

The line, the plan,
always honorable for life!

Congratulations...

I took the pledge.

One of the commitments was, "I will
never portray or allow Teen Mania

to be portrayed in a negative
light, past, present, or future."

Which... I have
definitely violated.

The Honor Academy,

a one year internship for committed
young adults who are driven

to find their purpose and make
a difference with their lives.

What this means is taking young
people who are serious about God

and helping them to
grow up as leaders.

Then the spark that they've
received, their passion for God,

their heart for the world,
doesn't just stay with them,

but it ends up affecting
their whole generation.

"Take a year of your
life and major in God."

And I will never forget
that as long as I live.

That was the phrase
that hooked me.

I really started to just
learn who I was here,

at the Honor Academy,
like who I'm meant to be.

You're a piece of coal in that fire,
just being kindled consistently.

I wanted to go somewhere before
college, just get grounded in my faith.

That's when
my journey started.

The Honor Academy is
the engine of Teen Mania.

Every intern who worked for Teen
Mania, had to go to the Honor Academy.

Here, we're going to utterly transform
you into this kind of soldier,

in this army of God.

When we come to Christ, it's
like joining a new family.

You're joining a new kingdom, Jesus
talked about, you're a warrior for Christ.

Ron would use this phrase,
"the mark of the warrior."

Going to the Honor Academy was
considered the ultimate mark of a warrior.

It was a mark of being chosen.

You were the elite.

An army of leaders,
a generation of world changers.

There's always the overarching idea
that we're in a war between good and evil.

So we were always told that we're going
to take the victory over the line.

We're going to take Christianity
to where it hasn't been before.

Media, politics, education.

And so it just seemed like
the natural next step to me

to go to the Honor Academy.

Going to a place where everybody else
was like me and was just as obsessed

with being bold for Jesus and being
on fire and changing the world.

Okay, I'm a high achiever.
Let's do it. Let's go, baby.

You're going to have
classes in how you become a leader.

Classes in how you influence
America, how you influence the world.

You would also do huge, dynamic
spiritual training experiences.

And I was like,
"That's awesome."

There was just something
in me that said that I should go.

I'm sure I said, like,
"Yes, God told me I should."

I'm sure that's what
I said.

You gonna argue with God?

I had a full scholarship
to a community college,

but I dropped out and joined
Teen Mania, for the internship.

I was driven. I
took it seriously.

You know, I argued
for my parents.

I want to go to Teen Mania. I
want to go to the internship.

I want to commit my life. I was like,
"That sounds like an adventure."

Teen Mania was located
in Garden Valley, Texas.

Very remote location.

You went by a guard station,
where a teenager would wave for you in.

The dorms were all named for martyrs,
like Elliot Hall, named for Jim Elliot.

The modern day martyr.

You're with all of these
people from all over the country.

The relationships that you form
in that kind of an environment

are so intense and so intimate, and
there's such a feeling of belonging.

I was an
artsy, go thy-looking teen.

I got very lucky to make
a lot of great friends.

Phil Boltz.

Carrie Saum.

I know that the leaders
called us the Rat Pack,

and it was a really fun group.
We were very sincere kids.

We were believers, but we
knew something was weird.

When we first got there, we
have to purge the outside world.

Those were the nights where
you've got the big bonfire

and people are throwing
their CDs into the fire.

You brought Twilight
in with you?

That was getting thrown
out as soon as you arrived.

Ron very much emphasized that
your parents will not understand this.

They're not going to
understand your passion.

God is the one you
have to truly respect.

When I went to the Honor Academy, I
was writing for Rolling Stone Magazine.

The long time story of Rolling
Stone is, "What are the kids into?"

But also always looking at suspicion with
like, "Who's trying to fool the kids?"

Welcome, all of you
guys who just got here.

Congratulations. You made it. You
are here in the Honor Academy.

Obviously, Ron was
really a big deal.

He was "the" Ron Luce, right?

We all wanted to
be there because of Ron.

-Coming to the Honor Academy?
-Yes, I am.

But once we got there, he wasn't
coming down to slum with us.

Sometimes you'd hear a motorcycle,
and be like, "Oh, here comes Ron."

Ron was the president,

but Dave Hasz, as executive director,
was the man in charge on campus.

Dave was
Ron's right hand man.

Ron cast the vision, and Dave
is the one that carried it out.

Who made me the director
of the Honor Academy?

Yes, God did. I understand
that. Excellent. Well done.

But God used who to put
me in this position?

-Ron Luce.
-Ron Luce.

Dave was an
intern in the early days,

and then he was hired on by
Ron Luce to run the internship.

He had a very
authoritative presence.

Feet!

Dave was like the very cool older
brother that everybody wanted to impress.

Exactly right. Seats.

He would say things like, "When I
was at school, my friends would run.

We would run from everywhere
we went, to save time."

So my friends and
I started running.

We'd go from the dorm to the
cafeteria, and we would... "Let's run."

We would run as fast as we
can. Big Jordan Peterson vibes.

He was supposed to be
the spiritual advisor.

He loved
the movie Braveheart.

A lot of comparing spiritual
warfare to Braveheart.

I think he had a Braveheart
sword in his office.

We need to be remembering the
fact that we are people of honor.

Down! Down!

With Dave Hasz,
everything was army oriented.

You should
know better by now!

Essentially, we were like
the Marines for Team Christ.

You have to be regimented, and
you have to listen to the hierarchy.

I mean, it makes sense because
we are here to change the world.

Every morning, we
would wake up at four o'clock.

-Count!
-Nine!

We would do jumping jacks. We
would work out until we threw up.

What they would say when we
were doing our morning exercises was,

"You beat your body, and
you make it your slave."

How many got to beat your body a
little bit? Make it your slave?

As a black man...

And you have a campus full of
white people coming up to me going,

"Beat your body. Make it
your slave." Not appropriate.

We'd all get back, have
two minutes to shower

before we would get dressed and go
eat and start our jobs for the day.

What we were told
about job assignments

was that you were being observed, and
then they were very seriously praying

about where you should
go in the ministry,

where God would most be
able to use you effectively.

But what I realized way
after the fact...

Was that the divine inspiration
for where you end up

is a lot more like
a draft.

Leaders sit in a room, and they say,
"I want so-and-so. I want this person."

If you were placed in
exec, in Ron's purview,

that was the very best
placement you could hope for.

I was placed as one of Ron
Luce's executive assistants,

which is not even something I
had on my radar as a possibility.

As an 18 year old, like,
that's pretty cool.

My job was a dancer and an
actor for the ministry team.

And what the ministry team
does is they travel around

to the Acquire the Fires, and
they put on the performances.

I was on the
ministry team as well.

We were the ones that were running almost
everything that you saw at these events.

I ended up being the worship
leader for Acquire the Fire.

My first show that I ever sang
was in front of 10,000 people.

But I had friends that
did not like their job.

Teen Mania was
very much of its name.

Every role that you can think of
was being filled by teenagers.

There were almost 1000 interns
on campus at any given time.

This was a huge operation.

You could be put on grounds
crew, janitorial crew, cafeteria crew.

After you've been told
you're going to go out there

and make this
difference for Christ,

you're going to go make
tater tots for a year.

These kids were like, "God
called me to the internship,

and now I have to
scrub the toilet."

There was definitely
a hierarchy at play.

International operations.
That's where I wanted to be.

That's where trips were planned. That's
where global work was worked out.

And there was one place
I didn't want to be.

That was the one...
the whole ministry.

I was like, "You want me to mow
lawns, dig holes? I'll do...

Just don't put me
on this one task."

So I thought, "I will trust God. God
is going to take care of me in this."

And I was assigned
to the call center.

The one place I
didn't want to be.

I was a teenage telemarketer for Jesus.

They were selling blocks
of tickets to Acquire the Fire,

or harassing people
to go on missions.

That's where the bulk
of us worked day to day.

You were a telemarketer that
was paying them to telemarket.

Oh, yeah, I forgot about that.
We paid to be there.

Nobody paid us to do this work.

As an intern, we all
paid a monthly sum.

I would raise funds to attend.

It was really expensive.

At the end
of Acquire the Fire,

you would fill out a card
with all of your information,

all in the name of
keeping up with you,

making sure you were getting
connected with the right resources.

We would have entire
pallets full of cards.

They became our lead cards.

Hello?

Hey, this is Morgan calling from
Acquire the Fire. How are you today?

Hey, Morgan. I'm
doing really good.

I worked A shift. I would
call youth pastors during the day.

B shift would call kids getting
home from school to be like,

"Come on the trip. Come on
the trip. Come on the trip."

And it's like, there's
a bell that you ring

when you get a commit
for a summer trip.

It was, "Can I get 120
or so calls a day?"

Working in the call center was
tallying how many calls you made

and how many commits you made.

I was calling synagogues.

"Don't you want to come to this
evangelical youth conference?

You really should come."

And they're like, "We're Jews."
They were like...

"You've misunderstood."

But we're like, "Let's get
them called numbers up."

-I wasn't bad at it. I was good at sales.
-Yeah.

But it was kind of soul killing.

I was in this to learn how to do
better international missions,

but they wanted me to move
those fingers to dial.

They wanted me to
get those commits.

Meanwhile...

I worked my entire year
to get off that team.

Started going to people and being
like, "Hey, a mistake's been made."

"No, no, you need to be
faithful with little.

You need to not complain.
You need to not be bitter."

You might say, I didn't want
this task. I wanted that task.

Well, you're not going to get that task
until you're faithful with this task.

You'd hear the phrase "die to self".
Dying to self is putting yourself last.

Shut down any selfishness, any thoughts
of your own self, your own needs.

-Don't listen to your body, your mind.
-Yeah.

Your life means nothing
compared to the purpose.

And they're like, "That's
what you don't want to do?

That's what God
wants you to do."

31 hours was the official
amount of time you're supposed to work,

but many were working
80, 100 hours.

Because you wanted to show
how intense for God you were.

I almost wish it was just a grift
because that's pretty easy to undo.

But this was more than that.
This was meant to transform them.

Don't you know that when you
offer yourselves to someone,

to obey him as slaves, you are
slaves to the one whom you obey,

whether you're slaves to
sin, which leads to death,

or to obedience, which
leads to righteousness.

Ron taught the weekly
character development class.

He was very good with words, very
good with framing things in a way

that made you go, "Oh,
yeah, you're right."

Without you getting a
chance to think about it.

Jesus learned to be obedient,
he wasn't naturally obedient.

They might call it growth, or
they might call it character development.

But it was the same lesson
plan every class, obedience.

What's character development
about? Obedience.

Well, how do you
grow? Obedience.

When you go to Honor Academy,
you commit to this set of rules.

They are all designed to separate you
from all the pieces that made you, you.

That's what we're
experiencing now.

A lot of rules were
based on purity culture.

I remember in high school being told
things like, "Oh, you're the hot one.

She's the marriable one."

Right? Things like that that
would really mess with my brain.

At the Honor Academy, I
wanted to reinvent myself.

During your year at the Honor Academy,
you're not allowed to date anyone.

And if you were in a
relationship when you got there,

you needed to break that off
immediately, which I did.

Purity culture was really big.

And at the Honor Academy,

we subscribed to a strict
version of Joshua Harris's book,

I Kissed Dating Goodbye.

He's a Christian activist and the
author of I Kissed Dating Goodbye,

Joshua Harris, Joshua!

Joshua Harris
jumped onto the scene

and took purity culture
to a more extreme level.

It's not just about saving sex.

And the point is is that a
lot of us get into rela...

I did this. I'm writing the book from
the mistakes that I've made in the past,

that we get emotionally involved, we lead
someone on, and then we break it off.

And we get into a pattern in our lives
of doing that for the rest of our lives.

-And that's a...
-But wait a minute.

But look, Bill, I mean,
you kind of say that,

and yet the picture you threw on your
book is kind of a pimp photograph.

You know what I mean?

It's a little like... Right?

I was like, "Oh, he's hot. He's so
cute." And all of us had a crush on him.

Oh, how the heartthrob has fallen.
I'm just now an old, bald guy.

So I'll take the past
compliment for sure.

In my book, I was like,
"We shouldn't date.

We should save ourselves, and you
should prioritize a godly marriage."

Basically, your thesis is
that the best way to find

the person of your
dreams is to stop dating.

Right.

Teen Mania really embraced the
message of I Kissed Dating Goodbye.

And it became the purity
culture handbook at Teen Mania.

I bought it, I read it, I followed
it. I believed in it 100%.

In the past, I have kissed
many different girls.

And you know, the reason
that I so regret that today

is because in each of
those relationships,

I was kissing someone
else's future wife.

The definition of purity
became more and more extreme,

even to the point of your
thoughts and your emotions.

Like you not only need
to keep your body pure,

but you need to keep your mind
pure. What are you thinking about?

Everyone was assigned
an accountability partner.

We would have to tell
accountability partner

every sinful thought we had, any
time we had broken the rules.

We were self enforcers.
We policed each other.

We were encouraged to
confront each other.

They gave us lessons.
There was a whole session.

It was the
system of control.

Positive reinforcement and
reward for telling your peers

if they were doing
something wrong.

I got confronted one time
for singing too good.

He told me that it
was too distracting,

and it was like leading
people away from worship.

If you did something wrong,

but then you immediately went to somebody
and said, "I did something wrong,"

they would, in theory,
be more lenient on you.

They called it running
for forgiveness.

During winter break, I did something
that a lot of teenagers did.

I watched a couple of minutes
of scrambled porn on HBO,

and in my mind, I'm going,
"I shouldn't have done that.

I shouldn't have done that. Well,
I'm not going to do it again."

And the guilt, the hot coal of guilt,
is just burning down into my stomach.

And I tell them what I did, and they
gave me three months of probation.

I didn't leave my room. I had
to tell my parents about it.

My mom immediately says,

"If you want to come home,
that is fine with us."

And I almost left.

However, since the
day I got there,

I could tell that the leadership there
thought I was not going to make it.

I was like, "I am going to stick this
out, and I'm going to show them."

Teen Mania definitely
used the message of purity

to create these rules
and to exert control.

And that is a pressure cooker.

This idea of a regime
with total control.

Well, human beings being human beings,
we know that that never really happened.

It's not so much about the
rules never being broken.

It's about people always,
always thinking about the rules.

The rules were designed
to remove the appearance of evil.

The appearance of evil
was being in a situation

or behaving in a way that
could give off the idea

that you're doing something wrong. It
didn't matter the intention behind it.

A guy and a girl sitting next
to each other in the dark.

That was the appearance of evil.

I wanted to get my hair braided.

I had to present to them the idea that
it was culturally a part of who I am.

So they need to find
somebody to braid my hair.

Well, there was
a girl on campus,

but the thing was there
was like maybe seven,

five to seven black
people on campus with me.

And whenever we were
sitting by ourselves,

we were confronted about
segregating ourselves

from the rest of this
all-white academy.

So to avoid the appearance of evil,
that we weren't segregating ourselves,

she braided my hair
in one of the offices,

but a staff member walks
by, and she's like,

"Guys, this doesn't look right.

This doesn't look right. This is... This
is... No. You're playing in his hair.

No. You have to... No, we
can't do this. Not here. No."

We had taken the steps to do
what we thought was right.

And here we're being told, "Hey,
what you thought was right is wrong."

When she said that, I felt tiny.

Like I didn't have the
ability to think for myself.

In that particular place...

there was no questioning
of authority.

We had, for the
Acquire the Fires,

a group of tribal dancers,
me, three white girls.

Brown paint.

And it was Ron's idea.

And we thought nothing of it.

Because it came from people that
we were taught not to question,

and to question would be rebellion.
And rebellion is not of God.

There was no space for racial
identity, human identity,

just Christian identity.

And again, obedience,
obedience to authority.

Even if you think authority is wrong,
even if you know authority is wrong,

the fact of authority is right.

Ron always sort of looking to blur
those lines between fantasy and reality.

He understood good theater
had a ritual element to it,

and he wanted to create
collaborative theater.

LTE's were "life transforming
events", and each one was different.

And they were all multiple days,

and they were supposed to teach you
through some sort of an experiential way.

We're going to drive people to get out of
their stinking little baby comfort zone

and get out there
and change the world.

We're going to find a
way to get the gospel

to the people that have never heard. The
unreached people groups of the world.

Can you tell us a little bit
about what you're going to go do?

Well, what we're
going to be able to do

is we're going to be able to
go preach the gospel to people.

We're gonna go tell
them about Jesus.

The Unreached People
Group. Oh, boy.

They split the campus in half.

Half into missionaries and
half into tribal people.

In what we call "the back 40",
so there's about 460 acres.

You have to figure out their
language, what God they serve,

and if you've converted them
by the end of the weekend,

you're a good Christian.

And in the descriptions in
the handbook, they say very vague...

"Your child will learn how
to go deeper in their faith."

Christian LARPing is what it is.

But the goal is to kind of blur those
lines between fantasy and reality.

We were always told
that in third world countries,

they're seeking us
out to eliminate us.

We had to go through "customs",

to give you a "real experience" of
what it's like to be a missionary.

-Hello. What's your name?
-Jessica.

-May I see your papers?
-Yes, ma'am.

And I remember lying and saying,
"No, I'm not preaching the gospel."

We're agriculturalists
for the Peace Corps.

I am a journalist doing an
article on the Peace Corps.

Doing a documentary with
the University of Phoenix.

We are with National Geographic.

So what are you
guys really going to do?

We're gonna go
minister to people.

Other cultures were seen
as these objects to be saved.

Cultural competency within that
space was almost nonexistent.

You have to go come into a
culture sensitive to the culture,

but you're invading
it. You aren't...

You're not totally becoming
like the tribe you're going to.

You're going to
change some things.

You might make some
waves, and that's okay.

When you look
at other cultures,

and you find all of the things
that make them in need of saving,

you break the ability to truly
be in communion with them.

And that can be very dangerous.

There were more and more things
that I was telling myself,

"Well, this doesn't
totally make sense,

but I'm sure it makes sense in a
way that I don't even realize."

Rest assured, if it seems like it's going
in a bad direction, it'll get worse.

Another life transforming
event was much worse.

The staff would literally come out
at like 3 o'clock in the morning

with pots and pans in the dorm and
wake you up out of a dead sleep.

Oh, boy. Oh, goody.

I wonder what we're
going to get to do next.

You were
blindfolded, put in a van,

and driven out to an
undisclosed location.

This was crosswalk.

Every so often they would go and tap
you on the shoulder if it was your turn,

and they would drop six,
seven, eight kids off.

My group was dropped
off in Oklahoma.

You didn't have any
money. You didn't have any cell phone.

And they give you two days
and a six foot tall wooden cross,

and they say, "Get
back to campus."

You are depending "on
God" for your food,

for where you're going
to sleep that night.

You couldn't ask for anything.

And because everyone is so
eager to obey the rules,

"Don't ask for things"
becomes "don't ask questions".

You can't ask anything.

"Where are we?"

Becomes "That's a cool map.
I wish I knew more about it."

After a couple of
hours of walking,

one of the girls goes, "Why aren't
people stopping and talking to us?"

And I go, "We're a bunch of white kids in
the middle of Texas with a wooden cross.

We probably look like we're
looking for the sheet store."

My group got picked
up by a pickup truck

whose driver may or may
not have been intoxicated.

Other groups had
guns pulled on them.

One night, we
are in the middle of nowhere.

Finally, we see some
headlights in the distance,

and then the car turned its
flashers on, it was a cop.

And that cop was
not happy to see us.

We go, "Okay, well,
can you help us out?"

He goes, "Okay, I
can drive you back."

And then he points to the cross.
He goes, "I'm not taking that."

And then one of the
girls starts crying

because we are going to
leave the cross behind,

and we are going to
fail our mission.

And this cop, who looked completely
overwhelmed by this teenage girl,

He goes like, "Okay, okay,
okay, Just put it on the top."

So we drove back
in this cop car.

We are holding on to the cross on top
of this cop car, holding it in place.

Because to get rid of that cross,
I mean, this is the message they want.

"You carry that cross
even if it kills you."

This isn't funny. If you
don't get back there,

it's not like you're not going to
get invited to the cool kids party.

If you don't get back there,

if you don't pass this test,
you're going to have betrayed God.

You're going to betray your
parents. You're going to betray Ron.

That's a real thing.

That's our martyr.

Did you assume as a
kid that you would die a martyr?

And that you would
have a short life?

Hmm.

When I look back in time,

I never thought there
would be another option.

Ron Luce invited Dad to go on a global
expeditions trip with Teen Mania,

and Dad was affected by this.

On the plane ride back,
there's Dad and Ron Luce.

And Dad is penning the lyrics to
this song called "Allegiance".

Dad, has it always
been this way?

Well, even from the
beginning, men hated Jesus.

Ray Boltz' "I Pledge Allegiance
to the Lamb" music video

where basically the dad's being
persecuted for being a Christian,

and he's like
talking to his kid.

But Dad, did they want to die?

No, but they were
forced to make a choice.

I remember watching that.
I'm traumatized from that

because the dad gets drug away, and
the kid's still in the prison cell.

So, you know, he's
probably going to die next.

But there was just this understanding
that we were willing to die for our faith.

That was a huge song for Dad.

Christians, long ago ♪

♪ Were brought before ♪

♪ A tyrant's throne ♪

"I Pledge Allegiance to the
Lamb" is such a clear depiction

of what was the
cultural understanding.

♪ But one by one
They chose to die ♪

We were told that eventually
Christians are going to be martyred again.

In April 1999, we were
driving to Pontiac, Michigan,

with Teen Mania for
this huge stadium event.

Practically the entire internship
of 500, 600 kids went to Pontiac.

We were all
working up to an event

that was being called "Day One".

That was going to be at the
Silverdome in Detroit, a huge arena.

It was going to be the
big daddy of them all.

Day One is a national
gathering of young people

that are on fire from
all over the country.

Coming together at the
Silverdome in Pontiac, Michigan.

It seats almost 90,000 people.

To make a statement to the world
there is a generation who do love God.

So we're driving up,

and we start hearing rumors of
some kind of a school crisis.

Something happened at a
school. It involved guns.

This tragedy is about
an hour and a half old now.

Apparently, the SWAT team has
mobilized outside of the school.

It was the
Columbine massacre.

Columbine High
School looks like a battle scene

after the worst school
shooting in US history.

Possibly as many as
25 students dead.

For us, who were teenagers,
school shootings were not common.

The idea that you could
be murdered in your school

was shocking and
horrifying and visceral.

So we get to Day One, and
we're trying to go on with the event.

But we started hearing the
stories of students who died.

These gunmen were going into the
school to single out individuals.

And one of the students

who was in the library reportedly
says that one of the gunmen

went up to a young girl, asked
her if she believed in God.

She said, "Yes, I do."
And they shot her.

The story of Cassie Bernall,
one of the students killed at Columbine.

Quickly becoming a
national symbol to people of faith.

That did not
turn out to be true,

but everyone thought,
"What would I have done?"

Darrell Scott, his daughter Rachel,
was killed outside Columbine High.

We always felt that the Lord
was going to use her in a mighty way,

and I think none of us would have
believed it would be in this manner.

When I heard the
whole story of...

that her dream was to be a missionary,
and she was just on fire for the Lord.

And then she gets cut down.

And in her youth, I thought
of some of the great martyrs

of Henry Martin Livingston,
Borden, Jim Elliot.

Rachel was signed up to go
with Teen Mania on a mission trip,

but before she could go, she was
murdered in the Columbine shooting.

A few days later, at Day
One, Ron talked about Columbine.

And it was the moment
the room turned upside down.

Rachel Scott
died that day.

One of the several martyrs
that stood up for her faith.

Now, the thing that is
unique about Rachel,

if you look around this room right
now, she was a normal person.

She'd been to concerts
like this, just like you.

There was something in
her heart that said,

"I've got to make my
life count this summer."

Ron looks at that, and
he sees an opportunity.

So he claims ownership of her.

And just like a myth
says, "This could be you."

Someone who cared about
the kids would say,

"This could be you, you
could be killed in school.

We've got to do
something to stop that."

He says, "Wouldn't
that be awesome?

This could be you. Your
name will be remembered."

And he was willing to teach a
generation of kids, you're expendable.

And maybe the most valuable
thing you could ever do is die.

Send me, Lord, where no
one ever wanted to go to.

Use me, Lord, to finish the
job, taking this world for you.

You're imagining yourself
as the subject of violence.

That the glory is the martyrdom.

These are the things I'm
thinking about as a teenager.

"I have to die. I have
to get ready to die.

You can do it, Mica.
You can do it."

You got to gin yourself up because
you don't wanna go to hell.

You can do it.

We're not just screaming
it with our voice,

but with our very
lives. We're shouting.

We are those with a
relentless pursuit of God.

A relentless pursuit
of the people He loves.

Now, shout! For the Lord has
given you this generation.

I don't think we would be
talking about Teen Mania now,

were it not for the
Columbine massacre in 1999.

After Day One, the tension
and the atmosphere at the Honor Academy

went from like a six
to a 12 overnight.

There was this big
push for everyone to know

where they stand in their faith,
to just push you to your limits,

to see if you would
stand up for your faith.

Nobody was playing anything
anymore. Everything was very real.

The Honor Academy
became more intense.

It became scarier and harder.

This is one
of the most demanding

and challenging training
opportunities that I know of,

and you are going to be challenged
more than you can possibly imagine.

You are going full right
now. You are going full right now.

Move it, move it, move it!

We are not going
to feel sorry for you.

Please do not feel
sorry for yourself.

ESOAL, which was the "Emotional
Stretching Opportunity of a Lifetime".

It's a simulated
Navy SEAL hell week,

outside in the mud
for 90 hours straight.

We've got crosses, platoons.

We all have helmets
with numbers on them.

We are no longer our
names. We are numbers.

353, do you feel

that you are in tension
with someone -

out there, by the way
that you pushed yourself?

I don't know.

Well, you're gonna wanna be
gentle, laying those crosses down.

If your belt breaks
off your cross,

-it's not going to be pretty.
-Eight...

Crawling through tunnels ten
feet underground and 30 feet long.

We need you
in that hole now.

Head first.

You just need some help here.

Once you get in, you can take him off
of you, but you need get in first.

Keep going, keep
going. Keep going.

This event is designed to
make you look inside of yourself

and depend upon God for your strength and
go beyond what you thought you could do.

God, the father, be with us for this
day and throughout the rest of the days.

-Father...
-I am a strong man of God.

I'm a strong man of God.
I'm a strong man of God.

What's your number
down there, orange shirt?

-243.
-243, why are you crying?

-I'm scared, sir.
-What are you scared of?

Pay attention! You are a loser!

This is my favorite
part of ESOAL.

I'm going to go be
the strong one now.

Come on, now.

This is the Mensa
challenge, okay?

It is a whole bunch of eighth
grade math problems, right?

We're going to give each
team the paper and a pen

and a certain amount of time, and then
we're going to see how well they do.

Then we're going to run
down and grade them,

and then we're going to line
them up by their intelligence.

No matter how
hard you push yourself,

there's always a little
bit more you can push.

Do it as if your pursuing the thing
that God put you on this planet for.

Go.

-All the way down to your shoulders.
-Let's go!

-All the way down here.
-Just keep walking.

-412, come all the way down here.
-Don't let go of the rope!

All the way down.

That pain and that
hurt and inappropriateness

of creating a spiritual climate

with this pretend
military training

was to get you to come to the
very, very end of yourself.

That was the moment I knew

that whatever it was before,
now they were raising martyrs,

and they were
recruiting children.

The rough beast now
comes plainly into view.

One time, they called
us into the auditorium.

Suddenly, some people
in military garb come in

and tell us we need
to bow to their flag.

Get on the ground!

That was the End
Times, it felt to me.

It wasn't even in the handbook.

The end times,
a lot of Christians believe

there will be a one world government
that will execute Christians.

Our leaders play act, they were
the evil one world government.

I don't even know how many, people
stormed in everywhere and like...

-The reception!
-Quiet, quiet!

It was an
attack on Christians,

and it was an attack on us.

And yourself! Sit
down, sit down.

They are life
transforming events.

If you think it's life or death,
and they're being taught that it is,

now we've gone into the area, which
I think can fairly be called torture.

Those people were traumatized.
They were terrorized.

Heightened sense of over
stimulation, over awareness.

Fear, and it's a
means of control.

Teen Mania was the most militant
fundamentalist Christian youth movement

the United States had seen in
at least a century, if not more.

And that's how Ron caught the
attention of the Arlington Group.

The Arlington Group was founded
in part by James Dobson,

and other Christian right
leaders with powerful fiefdoms.

They were trying to
align the organization,

so that instead of having one
fiefdom here and one fiefdom there,

they could build the kingdom
of God, and in Washington, DC.

Their goal is retaking America for
a certain vision of Christianity.

The Arlington Group was really designed
to be behind the scenes. Secretive.

These were really the
big, big, heavy hitters.

And then Ron, probably even to his own
surprise, got a seat at that table.

Teen Mania became part
of the Arlington Group.

That's how Ron and a man named
Charles Colson get together.

Colson's organization was
also a part of the group.

Colson was Nixon's hatchet man,
and he went to prison for it.

In prison, he was born again.

And he's working on this big
project. He wants to undo secularism.

Everything is a war against the very
conditions that made democracy possible.

Everything was the enemy.

He thinks the Enlightenment
was a bad idea.

All I care about is
advancing the kingdom of God.

And it's a
perfect marriage.

Well, we're on the
same page here.

If we don't start looking to kids,
what's going on with these young people?

Everything we're doing
now is going to be moot.

And together,
they just decide

we can make the whole
country an Honor Academy,

take their worldview
and make it go viral.

So they come up with
this idea called Rewired.

Their plan had the scope
of Acquire the Fire

and the deep indoctrination
of Honor Academy.

They produce videos.

It was 12 sessions, each
about an hour long on DVD.

All the tools you would need to recruit
and indoctrinate these followers

without needing them to even
attend Teen Mania events.

They were exciting,
highly produced lessons,

telling the teenagers of America
a war is being waged against them.

You've got to become a real soldier
before you become another casualty.

Amy!

The curriculum
was the greatest hits

of all their most harmful
teachings, but intensified.

It could go farther than
any Acquire the Fire.

It could go into every
corner of the country.

He's sending them out
through youth pastors.

Ron's thinking in
terms of cells, right?

Youth group here, youth
group here, youth group here.

And indoctrination.

They borrow all these motifs
from The Matrix movies.

You can take the blue pill
and keep being a sucker

and see what the establishment
wants you to see.

Or you can take the red
pill and see the reality.

You can see the truth, and
the truth is much grittier.

It's the battlefield.

-You are breaking through the matrix.
-We've got to wake up everyone else.

Rewired was designed to get
kids to see every single thing

through this lens
of "us versus them".

It's a matter of life
or death. This is war.

Which side are you on?

From Teen Mania to Acquire
the Fire to Rewired,

it's all preparation for the
coming battle. The ultimate fight.

Battlecry.

Let me hear your battle cry tonight!

I didn't hear you! Let me
hear your battle cry tonight!

Battlecry was Acquire
the Fire on steroids.

We want to shape the culture instead
of being shaped by the culture.

Ron's coming out as political.

The Pied Piper led the kids from
the stadium into the streets.

We were at war. We
were an army for God.

The army of God. You guys don't see
anything wrong with the army of God?

I'm a little nervous
because I think you might want

a theocracy in this country.

It's like Sarajevo.

This was fascism,

in front of me, on
a massive scale.

And you could say it's divisive.
Well, maybe it needs to be divisive.

You create a soldier who will follow
orders in an unquestioning way.

Mica was public
enemy number one.

This whole Teen Mania
thing has had me way down.

I just can't live like this anymore.
That's where I'm at right now.

They have to be stopped.