The dispute may come to a head on Friday afternoon when hundreds of Christian teenagers are expected to congregate on the steps of City Hall to pray and “raise their voices on behalf of their generation,” organizers said. A group opposing BattleCry plans to protest alongside.

Opponents have said that the rhetoric used onstage during these events is overtly antigay and subtly militaristic. Ben Rosen, a San Francisco organizer with World Can’t Wait, which is leading the protests, said his group was trying to repudiate what it sees as the deeper goals of BattleCry, including “imposing their biblical fundamentalist worldview on the country.”

That said, Mr. Rosen said protesters recognized that they were dealing with a delicate balance of expressing their opinions without appearing to be intolerant themselves.

“We’re not out to yell at kids that believe in Jesus; that’s awful,” he said. “It would be great,” he said of BattleCry, “if it didn’t have this very serious, very pernicious backbone to it.”

Tasha White, 18, attended the event last year and said it had opened her eyes to “a culture leading us into brokenness.”

“You look at Britney Spears, and what she did and that leads to divorce and rehab and drugs, and that’s a negative influence,” said Ms. White, who lives in nearby San Bruno and said she had had problems with under-age drinking herself. “And that’s not something I believe our generation should be looking forward to.”

Ms. White added that she did not think there was anything antigay about the event, though she believes gay people are “misguided.”