Columbia Childs of Pawtucket: “I’m just 13. I’m really not thinking about motherhood right now. I think Kim was kind of manipulating and using me.”

The Providence Journal / Connie Grosch

PAWTUCKET

Christians clash. And it’s caught on tape.

Well, that’s how ABC promotes tonight’s Wife Swap show, which features a Pawtucket family, the Childs. However, Columbia Childs, 13, puts the dramatic situations of the episode, distilled from two weeks of shooting, into perspective.

“There weren’t that many situations. But they picked them out.”

The show takes two women from two different families and has them switch roles for two weeks. The first week, the “guest” wife lives by the existing house rules. The second week, the “guest” wife makes the rules.

“There has to be a marked difference in how they parent, run their house and divide labor, how they discipline and whether they censor,” says Stef Wagstaffe, the show’s executive producer. “These are core elements of who we are. It doesn’t get more personal than that.”

The show has previously paired families of different faiths. This time, it paired families of the same faith, Christianity, but at opposite ends of the spectrum: liberal and conservative.

“We were very interested at the prospect of having two families explore how their faith underpins their parenting decisions,” Wagstaffe says.

Meet the Childs: Lee-Ann, 41, and Chris, 47, and their six children: twins Krisy and Lori, 18, Coburn, 17, Columbia, 13, Daisy, 11, and Cambria, 2. They’re the conservative family.

The Beckman-Heskett family of Colorado is the liberal family. Kim Beckman-Heskett is a company vice-president; her husband Randall, a former minister with three master’s degrees and a doctorate in religion, is a househusband, caring for their two 12-year-old daughters.

The Childs didn’t go looking to be on the show. The show came looking for them, electronically, via e-mail. Chris Childs, a truck driver, is president of the Rhode Island Christian Home Schoolers. Several weeks before receiving the e-mail, Lee-Ann and Chris Childs attended a Christian conference where people were encouraged to share their Christianity in their communities.

“We felt this would be a great opportunity to share what we believe as a family,” Lee-Ann says. “We knew we had something to share and we knew the children had something to say.”

So the Childs had a family meeting to see if their kids were receptive to the idea. They were.

“I thought it would be cool to be on TV,” Coburn says. “I know reality TV isn’t all reality. I thought I could try my acting and get my big break.”

“I could be an example and a motivation to millions of people of my generation to live with values and morals,” Lori says.

The Childs sent an e-mail back to the show’s producers, who replied within five minutes, asking for family photos and house rules.

“It was just a lark,” Lee-Ann says. “I never thought it would come to fruition.”

The Childs didn’t know what kind of family they would be exchanging with. They just prepared for the worst.

“We were geared up,” Lee-Ann says. “We thought, ‘Satan worshipers, bring them on.’ ”

A seven-member TV crew arrived at the Childs’ house in mid August. They shot the family together for a few days. Then Lee-Ann swapped places with the Colorado woman, and filming continued for two more weeks.

Let the show begin.

What you’ll see in the Childs’ home is much ado about dating. The show reports that the three oldest Childs children are prohibited from dating. But the Childs children say it’s their decision.

“I want to save my heart and my purity for my husband,” Lori says. “I have enough in my life now and don’t need to get mixed up in the emotion and drama of a relationship.”

Naturally Kim Beckman-Heskett’s suggested that Lori and her twin sister Krisy consider dating, speed-dating. After all, there were TV time constraints.

Chris Childs comes across in the show as strict and controlling, and adamantly opposed to the suggestion. But there’s nothing said about the girls’ opinion.

“We decided against it,” Krisy says. “And it was nonnegotiable.”

Another exchange revolves around Columbia. Kim Beckham-Heskett sees the Childs as coaching their daughters into domestic servitude to men. She senses Columbia would like to break away from that and have a career outside the home, which in fact, she does say on tape, and later retracts.

But Columbia says today that she’d like a career and motherhood, too. But, she notes, she’s really too young to say.

“I’m just 13. I’m really not thinking about motherhood right now. I think Kim was kind of manipulating and using me. I’m 13 and she’s 40-something and was using her high-powered mind to make me seem rebellious.”

One claim in the program that can’t be denied is that Chris Childs is “brainwashing” his children, with strict Christian principles. Kim Beckham-Heskett accuses him of that, and he agrees.

“I am brainwashing my children to love the Lord, Jesus Christ … and I am not ashamed of that.”

When Coburn hears about the accusation and admission, he’s incredulous, calling Beckham-Heskett a liar, because his father would never say he’s brainwashing them.

The next thing you know, Chris Childs is explaining to his children why he said he was brainwashing them. It looks a little like spin control. The father says he was talking about the Lord “washing with his love.”

The Childs now have a bag of official family lapel buttons that say “Brain Washed,” which Coburn hands out to guests.

“On the show we look so serious,” Coburn says. “But everyone says we’re the funniest people they know.”

Well, out in Colorado, Lee-Ann brought a man to tears. And she says she did it just by politely and respectfully disagreeing with Randall Beckham-Heskett.

“They didn’t show what I said to him.”

Lee-Ann did request that Randall Beckham-Heskett get a job outside the house. She suggested he become a carpenter, in the spirit of Jesus. She also asked his two daughters, who previously performed no household chores, to chip in.

At the end, the two families, which each received $20,000 for their involvement, appeared unchanged by the experience. The only before-and-after difference presented in the program is Chris Childs now helps out in the kitchen.

“I used to think dishes were kryptonite. Now I can go near them and I don’t lose my power.”

The experience, according to Krisy, “reconfirmed our family values and solidified our family.”

Wife Swap airs tonight at 8 p.m. on Channels 5, 6.

brourke@projo.com