Does God exist, where is he, and how is he influencing America were questions that prompted four students to take a five-week road trip across America last summer.
Michael Allen and Austin Meek, both Texas A&M students, and Will Bakke and Lawson Hopkins from Baylor University, teamed up to make an independent feature-length documentary called “One Nation Under God.”
“The movie is about questioning,” said Meek, a freshman finance major. “It’s about not believing what your parents told you just because they told you it.”
Starting in Dallas, the group traveled over 10,000 miles to major American cities including Las Vegas, Los Angeles, Portland, Chicago, New York and Atlanta.
“We met a lot of people who believed in God but didn’t believe that Jesus is the only way to get to heaven or believe in hell,” Meek said. “There was a common theme of ‘What’s right for me is right for me and what’s right for you is right for you.'”
They raised money to shoot the film by sending out support letters that earned them a budget of approximately $6,000. Bakke borrowed a camera from a friend, they drove Meek’s car, and used www.couchsurfing.com to find free places to stay.
“My favorite part of the trip was when we stopped in New York,” said Allen, a junior accounting major. “We were in Times Square and we had no place to stay. We had our backpacks on our backs and that was it. And we didn’t care.”
One thing the four of them made a point not to do was evangelize to people.
“We didn’t feign to know everything,” Meek said. “We were just trying to ask people questions that would make them think. Ultimately, we thought that if people think hard enough they’ll find the truth in the Gospel.”
The movie was done for the guys to find their own truth about religion as much as to find what other people think about Christianity.
“The experience taught me that there’s so much out there more than what I’ve known,” Allen said. “I’m definitely a stronger believer in the Bible now, but I recognize that other people approach things differently than me.”
Where to see:The movie will be showing at 7 p.m. and 9:30 p.m. on Thursday at Bryan Premiere Cinema 16 off Highway 6. Tickets can be purchased online at www.onenationmovie.com or at the theater. Part of the proceeds will be donated to A&M’s The PB&J project, which helps to raise awareness about global hunger.