The film's best performance is by Kristen Wiig as Ruth Buggs, and yet it also points out the exaggerated lengths they went to while mining for laughs. I'm not a Christian, but even I was offended by the way she and her father were portrayed when they were first introduced. I know many Christians (nearly everyone else in my family for instance) who retain their faith and yet can still embrace the possibility that science has some answers not conceived of when the Bible was written. Bishop Ussher claimed the Earth was created in 4004 B.C. (thus just over 6000 years old), and some fundamentalists still hold to that belief, and yet Ruth claims it is just 4000 years old. That either makes the writers lazy or else they were attempting to imply Ruth was extremely dumb. And then when she encounters Paul her reaction is to throw out all her beliefs as if morality means nothing and anything goes from that point on.