“I know so many gay Christians who have such a guilt in their hearts, because they honestly think that the Bible may be right. It could be right. What if we are wrong, and we are sinners, and we are all going to Hell?”

So speaks Thomas, a charismatic 18 year old who has gathered together with other teenagers at an overnight camp for gay Christian youths. At an age when many of their peers are more worried about acne and adding to their MySpace Friends list, Thomas and other midwestern teenagers are confronting questions about personal sexual identity and their mortal souls.

Thomas and his new friends bond over campfires, participate in team-building, and pour out their hearts in intimate video interviews. Among the teens is Scancy, a purple-haired, bisexual Goth-girl, who comes to camp questioning her Christian identity; Christine, a hyperactive, Elvis-obsessed, home-schooled loner who relies on her strong Christian faith to cope; and Jesse, the attractive and popular boy who struggles with being the object of everyone’s affection.

Camp Out is a new feature documentary from reality TV producers Kirk Marcolina and Larry Grimaldi. In published interviews, the filmmakers talk of receiving letters from parents of gay children expressing gratitude for insight into their children’s experience.

For these six boys and four girls in this film, it’s just as hard to come out as Christian as it is to come out as gay. They’re caught in the battle between religion, politics and sexuality that’s raging in the United States today. These kids are outsiders — their straight classmates ostracize them and their churches reject them. But like all teens, they yearn to feel at home, somewhere. They narrate their own personal journeys as they struggle to find acceptance in a religion that preaches that their sexuality is sinful. Camp Out tackles the question of why, in spite of the climate of many churches, these kids yearn to be a part of the Christian faith.