So the story goes, Olive helps save a homosexual friend from his daily trials and tribulations by agreeing to have fake sex with him at a party, so everyone could hear. He would be considered a god and she a slut, but she didn't care. She was helping a friend and his happiness was more important to her than her own reputation. Eventually other not so attractive/popular males find out she is doing such "deeds" and ask her to help them, which she does, reluctantly.
All the while, the "Jesus Freaks" at school, as they are termed, giver her hell because she is a whore. They call her names, tell her she is going to hell and say awful, horrid things to her and about her to every one. They say they want to pray for her, but they also want her to to get the hell out of their school. This is all coming from a group who sings praise and worship songs during lunch and changes the mascot at school from the Blue Devils to the Woodchucks. All in the name of Jesus.
They begin reading the Scarlet Letter in English class and one of the Lord lovers tells Olive she should start wearing a red letter on her clothing as she too is a skank. So, Olive does just that. She wears the most provocative clothing possible, with a big red "A" sewn into every piece.
During a visit to the counselor's office, she runs into Mary Ann, the leader of the Jesus Freaks, crying outside. She tells Olive her boyfriend's parents are getting a divorce. Olive does her best to comfort her and Mary Ann tells her, "But they go to our church! What will people think?" Olive says it will all work out and Mary Ann is convinced she has converted her and hugs her. She wants to be best friends with her now, because she is converted and they begin to hang out every day together.
A few days later, Mary Ann's boyfriend is in the doctor's office with chlamydia, and blames it on Olive when prompted by his mother (while she slaps him incessantly) to confess. His mother calls Mary Ann's mother and she calls Mary Ann at school and tells her. Mary Ann goes to Olive and slaps her in the face.
I wont' give away the ending, but it's a pretty good one. What I will give away is my opinion of the movie and it's moral story.
I wasn't disgusted at all with Olive's fake promiscuity, what I was disgusted with was the portrayal of the Christian faith in the movie. I feel like this is what people think Christians are really like, and yes I do agree there are a lot of them like this. But what about the rest of us? The one's who don't act like that at all? We get lumped into this stereotype that we live an outside profession of faith and on the inside we are rotten to the core. Even though she never proclaimed to have religious beliefs of her own, she acted more like Jesus in the movie than the Jesus freaks themselves. She put others needs before her own and helped her friends and even those she wasn't friends with. She never judged anyone, for anything. Now I am not saying it's appropriate to have fake sex all over school in an effort to be like Christ, but in all reality, I would choose her role over Mary Ann's any day. It seems to me that people who portray Christians and even people who claim to be Christians think waaaaay too much about what others think and show no compassion or love to those who don't believe the way they do. This was not Jesus' message at all. He came to save the sinners, not the saints. And for that matter, God is not impressed by how much scripture you can quote, how many times you pray and what you say when you do it or even how many worship songs you know. He cares about your heart and what you do for others. He has left us with a new commandment from the cross. "Love your neighbor as I have first loved you." I think if we were to be graded on such matters of faith, the latter would get us an "Easy A."
