REPORTER: Sophie McNeill
First class is finish at Patrick Henry College but there's no cigarette break for these uni students. They're off for a fix of another kind - daily chapel service. It's a highlight of 19-year-old Michael Holcomb's day. In fact, Michael's still on a high from prayer group last night.
MICHAEL HOLCOMB: Actually it's really my favourite part of the week just being able to get together with young men and women who are like really serious about God and just really awesome people.
There are now over 500,000 American kids, taught at home for religious reasons, and this is the country's first university for these evangelical home-schooled Christian children.
Just five years old, this small, privately funded college has become one of the top Christian universities in the US. For the staff and the students here, it's a calling to lead America towards a new morale agenda.
PASTOR: For what purpose is it that he's called me in this time when we've seen the erosion of the sanctity of life ethic, when we've seen 44 million children perish as a consequence of abortion. Could it be that you have been called for this purpose at this time, for the purpose of the saving of many lives?
MICHAEL FARRIS, FOUNDER: The way to describe the future Patrick Henry graduate is leader. We want those who will lead the nation and shape the culture.
Michael Farris founded Patrick Henry College. He is a major player within the evangelical Christian community in Washington. A father of 10, all home schooled, Farris believes America's universities are dominated by left leaning liberal ideology.
MICHAEL FARRIS: The homosexual dominance of the campuses, the Marxist dominance of the campus, the number one selling textbook in America at the college level is a Marxist history of the United States, by a man name Howard Zinn, a professor in Boston called 'A People's History of the United States. It outsells all other forms of textbooks in the country. It is just utterly dominated by the left.
A second year majoring in literature, this is the first time Michael has been taught in a classroom environment. He was home schooled by his mother, because of a distrust of the public education system.
MICHAEL HOLCOMB: Within the public school system you see a lot of corruption. You see a lot of one particular world view getting pounded in, a lot of liberalism has seeped in and a lot of political correctness.
Your typical Patrick Henry student, Michael is deeply conservative. He is against gay marriage, adamantly pro-life and he believes that religion is central to good governance.
MICHAEL HOLCOMB: You can't have real freedom unless the people make the right decisions and they do the right things and... It has to be - they have to be religious, they have to follow moral codes of the Bible or whatever they're religion is and they have to govern themselves and do what's right.
Like all students here, 21-year-old Rachel Williams had to pledge allegiance to a literal interpretation of the Bible before she was allowed to enrol.
RACHEL WILLIAMS: On the basic tenants of the Christian faith we were asked to sign a theological statement. In addition to that, we are asked to sign an honour code. It's pretty much backed up by scripture verses saying that we will not sleep with someone until we are married. We will not use language, just really behave as a Christian should behave.
The honour code forbids any kind of public affection, except holding hands and then only outside in the quadrangle.
RACHEL WILLIAMS: I believe the rule is that there can't be any public displays of affection in buildings.
And the rules are strictly enforced. I did this interview with Michael in the study room because as a female, I'm not allowed into his dorm.
MICHAEL HOLCOMB: It's not so much a bunch of rules as it is a philosophy. We want to do what's right and we want to live by God's principles, we want to live by moral principles.
The college also blocks certain TV channels that are considered inappropriate, such as the music channel MTV.
MICHAEL HOLCOMB: It's sleazy stuff that's going to cause our young men to be pulled astray and to lust and we just - we don't feel like that's something that we should be bringing into the campus.
But the strict rules aren't a turn off for these students.
STUDENT: They hold a set of solid values. And that's something that I appreciate in a college. That's what I was looking for. A place where they wouldn't just say anything that you want is right. But that there are absolute rights and wrongs in the world.
Almost all the kids here are full fee paying, white and middle class. In fact, any student who takes a government loan isn't even allowed to enrol at Patrick Henry. This enables the college to operate outside government regulations that would normally forbid discrimination against homosexuals and non-Christians.
I asked Dr Paul Bonicelli, Dean of Academic Affairs, how the teaching at Patrick Henry differs from any normal public university.
DR PAUL BONICELLI, DEAN OF ACADEMIC AFFAIRS: Most Berkeley professors wouldn't bother to bring in Christianity except to attack it. Patrick Henry would say it is the foundation of where we teach from.
What's taught as true here in addition to everything else that's taught that's relevant to the debate will be conservative, will be in line with our faith statement as well.
This fundamentalist Christian philosophy has distinct political leanings. These students spent last November at different Republican campaigns around the US.
STUDENT: What a bunch of Patrick Henry students did was we went and led different groups of those teenagers at different campaigns across the country.
The trips were paid for by an organisation linked to the college.
DR PAUL BONICELLI: The students are pretty much all Republicans. For the most part they essentially fit the Republican party's profile of the typical activist, which is a fairly conservative person and one who would readily go and work for someone like George Bush.
STUDENT: I think it's most important that for the conservative movement that we do have people who can carry on that message and that we don't just have one generation of conservatives but that next generation comes even more strongly.
With such a supply of ready recruits, the college has made a strong impression in George Bush's White House.
MICHAEL FARRIS: It's a warm relationship. Perhaps the best way to measure that is there are - there's an open door at the White House for interns from Patrick Henry College. We've placed a number of interns in the White House over the last four years and at one point we had more interns there than any other college in the country.
That's more than Harvard and more than Yale. The success of this tiny college is extraordinary.
REPORTER: Don't you think you would receive a better education and be more challenged if every day you were in a classroom with people who thought, you know, a lot different from you?
MICHAEL HOLCOMB: Well, I mean we do have actually a wider variety of thought here than you would think. We're learning all the stuff that you're learning in another university. All the same philosophers, all the same science. We do learn about evolution, we just teach it as a theory instead of a fact because it's not.
MICHAEL FARRIS: If we're willing to say everybody should get to say whatever they want to say in the area of politics, everybody should get to say what they want to say in the area of religion, then you're open and that's what we teach and that's what we believe. So the premise that we're narrow minded is false.
But enough of politics and religion, tonight is the chance to let your hair down. It's the Patrick Henry Liberty Ball.
RACHEL WILLIAMS: This is my dress. I'll be wearing this to liberty ball. I'm looking forward to it. I bought it this summer.
MICHAEL HOLCOMB: We get together, we go to this old classical home up in north of Leesburg and a bunch of the student body get together, dress up in 17th, 18th century dress and we do a classical English country dance with waltzes and a live string quartet. Just really, really fun event for the whole student body.
REPORTER: What's in store for this evening?
STUDENT: Well, right now this is just kind of everybody gets here, mills around, eats, drinks punch.
REPORTER: Is there going to be any drinking this evening?
STUDENT: No, this is a dry event. Actually there's a school policy while school is in session and you're in the greater DC area, you may not consume alcohol except for during the communion service.
REPORTER: So lots of good, clean fun?
STUDENT: Very good clean fun, yes.
As the Liberty Ball gets under way, Dr Bonnecelli says the college's conservative Christian agenda as a much needed return to the values of America's founding fathers.
DR PAUL BONICELLI: When you compare the United States, for example, with Western Europe, with France or something like that and you find continued support for the death penalty, continued huge majorities saying they believe in God, huge numbers that support more freedom rather than more government restriction, it's clear that this is essentially what America is and always has been.
Back on the dance floor, the good clean fun is getting out of control. That honour code band on holding hands whilst inside seems to have been forgotten.
The highlight of the night is the reading of the liberty or death speech. A famous call to arms given by the college's namesake that spurred on the American Revolution.
STUDENT: If we mean to preserve inviolate those inestimable privileges for which we have been so long contending, three millions of people armed in the holy cause of liberty in such a country as we possess, are invincible by any force with which our enemy can send against us. We must fight. I repeat it, sir, we must fight.
For the students at Patrick Henry College, the battle has been joined and it's a crusade for the soul of America.
STUDENT: The war is inevitable and let it come. I repeat, sir, let it come.
First class is finish at Patrick Henry College but there's no cigarette break for these uni students. They're off for a fix of another kind - daily chapel service. It's a highlight of 19-year-old Michael Holcomb's day. In fact, Michael's still on a high from prayer group last night.
MICHAEL HOLCOMB: Actually it's really my favourite part of the week just being able to get together with young men and women who are like really serious about God and just really awesome people.
There are now over 500,000 American kids, taught at home for religious reasons, and this is the country's first university for these evangelical home-schooled Christian children.
Just five years old, this small, privately funded college has become one of the top Christian universities in the US. For the staff and the students here, it's a calling to lead America towards a new morale agenda.
PASTOR: For what purpose is it that he's called me in this time when we've seen the erosion of the sanctity of life ethic, when we've seen 44 million children perish as a consequence of abortion. Could it be that you have been called for this purpose at this time, for the purpose of the saving of many lives?
MICHAEL FARRIS, FOUNDER: The way to describe the future Patrick Henry graduate is leader. We want those who will lead the nation and shape the culture.
Michael Farris founded Patrick Henry College. He is a major player within the evangelical Christian community in Washington. A father of 10, all home schooled, Farris believes America's universities are dominated by left leaning liberal ideology.
MICHAEL FARRIS: The homosexual dominance of the campuses, the Marxist dominance of the campus, the number one selling textbook in America at the college level is a Marxist history of the United States, by a man name Howard Zinn, a professor in Boston called 'A People's History of the United States. It outsells all other forms of textbooks in the country. It is just utterly dominated by the left.
A second year majoring in literature, this is the first time Michael has been taught in a classroom environment. He was home schooled by his mother, because of a distrust of the public education system.
MICHAEL HOLCOMB: Within the public school system you see a lot of corruption. You see a lot of one particular world view getting pounded in, a lot of liberalism has seeped in and a lot of political correctness.
Your typical Patrick Henry student, Michael is deeply conservative. He is against gay marriage, adamantly pro-life and he believes that religion is central to good governance.
MICHAEL HOLCOMB: You can't have real freedom unless the people make the right decisions and they do the right things and... It has to be - they have to be religious, they have to follow moral codes of the Bible or whatever they're religion is and they have to govern themselves and do what's right.
Like all students here, 21-year-old Rachel Williams had to pledge allegiance to a literal interpretation of the Bible before she was allowed to enrol.
RACHEL WILLIAMS: On the basic tenants of the Christian faith we were asked to sign a theological statement. In addition to that, we are asked to sign an honour code. It's pretty much backed up by scripture verses saying that we will not sleep with someone until we are married. We will not use language, just really behave as a Christian should behave.
The honour code forbids any kind of public affection, except holding hands and then only outside in the quadrangle.
RACHEL WILLIAMS: I believe the rule is that there can't be any public displays of affection in buildings.
And the rules are strictly enforced. I did this interview with Michael in the study room because as a female, I'm not allowed into his dorm.
MICHAEL HOLCOMB: It's not so much a bunch of rules as it is a philosophy. We want to do what's right and we want to live by God's principles, we want to live by moral principles.
The college also blocks certain TV channels that are considered inappropriate, such as the music channel MTV.
MICHAEL HOLCOMB: It's sleazy stuff that's going to cause our young men to be pulled astray and to lust and we just - we don't feel like that's something that we should be bringing into the campus.
But the strict rules aren't a turn off for these students.
STUDENT: They hold a set of solid values. And that's something that I appreciate in a college. That's what I was looking for. A place where they wouldn't just say anything that you want is right. But that there are absolute rights and wrongs in the world.
Almost all the kids here are full fee paying, white and middle class. In fact, any student who takes a government loan isn't even allowed to enrol at Patrick Henry. This enables the college to operate outside government regulations that would normally forbid discrimination against homosexuals and non-Christians.
I asked Dr Paul Bonicelli, Dean of Academic Affairs, how the teaching at Patrick Henry differs from any normal public university.
DR PAUL BONICELLI, DEAN OF ACADEMIC AFFAIRS: Most Berkeley professors wouldn't bother to bring in Christianity except to attack it. Patrick Henry would say it is the foundation of where we teach from.
What's taught as true here in addition to everything else that's taught that's relevant to the debate will be conservative, will be in line with our faith statement as well.
This fundamentalist Christian philosophy has distinct political leanings. These students spent last November at different Republican campaigns around the US.
STUDENT: What a bunch of Patrick Henry students did was we went and led different groups of those teenagers at different campaigns across the country.
The trips were paid for by an organisation linked to the college.
DR PAUL BONICELLI: The students are pretty much all Republicans. For the most part they essentially fit the Republican party's profile of the typical activist, which is a fairly conservative person and one who would readily go and work for someone like George Bush.
STUDENT: I think it's most important that for the conservative movement that we do have people who can carry on that message and that we don't just have one generation of conservatives but that next generation comes even more strongly.
With such a supply of ready recruits, the college has made a strong impression in George Bush's White House.
MICHAEL FARRIS: It's a warm relationship. Perhaps the best way to measure that is there are - there's an open door at the White House for interns from Patrick Henry College. We've placed a number of interns in the White House over the last four years and at one point we had more interns there than any other college in the country.
That's more than Harvard and more than Yale. The success of this tiny college is extraordinary.
REPORTER: Don't you think you would receive a better education and be more challenged if every day you were in a classroom with people who thought, you know, a lot different from you?
MICHAEL HOLCOMB: Well, I mean we do have actually a wider variety of thought here than you would think. We're learning all the stuff that you're learning in another university. All the same philosophers, all the same science. We do learn about evolution, we just teach it as a theory instead of a fact because it's not.
MICHAEL FARRIS: If we're willing to say everybody should get to say whatever they want to say in the area of politics, everybody should get to say what they want to say in the area of religion, then you're open and that's what we teach and that's what we believe. So the premise that we're narrow minded is false.
But enough of politics and religion, tonight is the chance to let your hair down. It's the Patrick Henry Liberty Ball.
RACHEL WILLIAMS: This is my dress. I'll be wearing this to liberty ball. I'm looking forward to it. I bought it this summer.
MICHAEL HOLCOMB: We get together, we go to this old classical home up in north of Leesburg and a bunch of the student body get together, dress up in 17th, 18th century dress and we do a classical English country dance with waltzes and a live string quartet. Just really, really fun event for the whole student body.
REPORTER: What's in store for this evening?
STUDENT: Well, right now this is just kind of everybody gets here, mills around, eats, drinks punch.
REPORTER: Is there going to be any drinking this evening?
STUDENT: No, this is a dry event. Actually there's a school policy while school is in session and you're in the greater DC area, you may not consume alcohol except for during the communion service.
REPORTER: So lots of good, clean fun?
STUDENT: Very good clean fun, yes.
As the Liberty Ball gets under way, Dr Bonnecelli says the college's conservative Christian agenda as a much needed return to the values of America's founding fathers.
DR PAUL BONICELLI: When you compare the United States, for example, with Western Europe, with France or something like that and you find continued support for the death penalty, continued huge majorities saying they believe in God, huge numbers that support more freedom rather than more government restriction, it's clear that this is essentially what America is and always has been.
Back on the dance floor, the good clean fun is getting out of control. That honour code band on holding hands whilst inside seems to have been forgotten.
The highlight of the night is the reading of the liberty or death speech. A famous call to arms given by the college's namesake that spurred on the American Revolution.
STUDENT: If we mean to preserve inviolate those inestimable privileges for which we have been so long contending, three millions of people armed in the holy cause of liberty in such a country as we possess, are invincible by any force with which our enemy can send against us. We must fight. I repeat it, sir, we must fight.
For the students at Patrick Henry College, the battle has been joined and it's a crusade for the soul of America.
STUDENT: The war is inevitable and let it come. I repeat, sir, let it come.