"I think of this film as a wake-up call," Steven Lipscomb '84, director of "Battle for the Minds," said. The film is a documentary on the fundamentalist invasion of the Southern Baptist Convention.
"Battle for the Minds" has won praise for its probing investigation of the take-over.
The film received the Best Feature Film award at the Louisville Film Festival and the runner-up Audience Choice Award at the 1996 Vancouver Film Festival.
"Battle for the Minds" will also be featured on the PBS series POV.
Viewers of the documentary Saturday should be prepared for a slap in the face.
Southern Baptists have historically been proponents of religious freedom. The victims of religious persecution themselves, they were instrumental in devising the First Amendment.
As a modern political entity, they have come full circle. In the late1970s fundamentalists seized control of the Southern Baptist Convention.
Baptists in the United States number 15 million people, making the Southern Baptist Convention a political juggernaut.
Lipscomb became interested in the power shift since his mother is a Southern Baptist pastor. Women are being coerced out of the Southern Baptist ministry.
"There are places she can't speak because she is a woman," he said. "I find that shocking in this country."
"Nobody knew this was going on," he continued. "I felt it was a moral imperative to get the message out."
His film is currently relevant, because the Baptist hierarchy is boycotting the Disney Company for extending health care benefits to gay employees.
"Battle for the Minds" is Lipscomb's first film.
"I had never been in a film set or an editing studio," he said. "It was the most phenomenal ride of my life."
His first effort shows remarkable control and an acute sense of drama and point of view.
The film has a cast of Southern gentlemen and women, as well as vipers and theological opportunists.
"Battle for the Minds" first documents the 1995 Southern Baptist Convention in Atlanta and traces its history to the beginning of the fundamentalist invasion.
The film shows a threat to the First Amendment in a an artful and thought-provoking way.
"You won't be able to watch this film without being scared that this will happen on a larger scale," Lipscomb said.
