And Warren's show Saturday night was the equivalent of putting 400 pounds worth of presidential candidates on the hook.

Perhaps more worrisome, the candidates baited themselves on those hooks, and gave Warren his own Christianist bully pulpit. That both candidates would feel the need to hew toward religiosity for legitimacy is pretty scary, given how superficially Christian American Christianists are. It is a political movement buttressed by the Bible, and always has been -- the reactionaries of this country realized that it was the perfect weapon to use against their adversaries. Even with Warren and Osteen-style velvet gloves in the mix, they found their perfect weapon. The way to defuse it is for Americans to be honest Christians (e.g., caring the poor and the weak), but that's a helluva lot of work, more than most of the Christianists are willing to do.

Times like these I really miss the commentary of Frank Zappa.

Why is it that Warren and most memebers of his church are obviously guilty of gluttony, one of the seven supposedly deadly sins, and no one cares?

Abortion and being gay are not "deadly sins". Why is it Christ-ies have no ethics, no problems with lying, and believe the ends justify the means?

Why are my athiest and agnostic friends "holier" than Christ-ies?

. . . to lump Warren and Joel Osteen together. Osteen's just the latest Elmer Gantry, prosperity-gospel charlatan to come along. Warren is obviously sincere, regardless of what you think of his technique, church, or theology.

There have been two postings in the past two days here about Warren wanting to be Billy Graham II. Is there anything concrete to base these opinions on? Paranoid rumblings, sadly similar to what we usually see on Fox News, are hardly the basis for decent reportage or analysis.

I spoke to a friend of mine after the "forum" and he asked me how Obama did. I responded that I was appalled that the event even took place, and that I considered what happened was the 21st century version of a religious test. He was taken aback a little bit by my reaction, saying, in essence, "I didn't see that there was that much wrong with it," going on to tell me how well Obama sounded and how McCain painted himself into a corner on many issues.

My friend missed, and still misses, the point entirely. Taken as a "stand-alone" event, I thought that there were many things that Obama did well, as well as McCain. What sent a chill down my spine was the fact that the success of this forum has guaranteed that this type of questioning will be part of the presidential selection process for (at least) decades to come.

Now, both Obama and McCain profess to be Christian, so when Warren asked them what it meant to be a Christian, it was tantamount to a softball. But when I hear future leaders of our country saying, "Jesus died on the cross for my sins...I am redeemed in the blood...etc, etc, etc." it infuriates me. What that forum did was vaildate the false notion that this is a Christian country, and that if you want to be a president, you must follow Jesus at the peril of your candidacy.

We are making strides in the U.S. A black president seems a likely possibility this November. But this forum has sent us back thirty years when it comes to the role of religion in politics. What if Leiberman had to answer those questions? as soon as he said he didn't believe that Jesus died for his sins, every evangelical would have shut him off, even if he said that he would arrest every doctor who did an abortion and put prayer back in schools. "I don't care about all that," they would say, "he's gonna burn in hell because he's a Jesus hater."

I think of our future leaders, and how anyone who can't answer the "what does Christianity mean to you question" properly is doomed in politics. We'd never elect an athiest, but what about a Buddhist? A Mormon (Romney was sunk partially because of that)?

The line of church and state just got moved back an inch by Reverend Warren. And partially because of my friend's ambivalence toward the forum on faith, the line will get moved again and again each presidential cycle.

I am LOVING it.

How far must a religious organization, such as Saddleback Church, encroach into the America's electoral process to endanger its tax-exempt status?

Are we electing a president or a head mullah?

Rev Warren and the Religious Industrial Complex were the winners of this whole debacle. They'll continue to drain taxpayer dollars into their coffers via "faith-based" initiatives and tax exempt mansions.

Hey Obama and the Democratic Party - you've just been punk'd...again.

Barack has made some inroads with the middle class Christians with this appearance. If if makes people see that he's open to working with everyone, then I'm all for it. Plus when he is elected, maybe these people will come around and see he is for the people and not just the corporations.

From Warren's Beliefnet interview:

"I'm a pastor, I'm not a prophet, so I would not predict how evangelicals are going to vote. I will tell you they're not monolith. That's a big myth. They're going to make up their minds based on the hierarchy of their values. For many evangelicals, of course, if they believe that life begins at conception, that's a deal breaker for a lot of people. If they think that life begins at conception, then that means that there are 40 million Americans who are not here [because they were aborted] that could have voted. They would call that a holocaust and for them it would like if I'm Jewish and a Holocaust denier is running for office. I don't care how right he is on everything else, it's a deal breaker for me. I'm not going to vote for a Holocaust denier..."

Seems now in retrospect, Warren just wanted to juxtapose John McCain with the baby killer/Holocaust denier. Wow, this is just beyond disheartening. You have to give Obama credit for walking into this lion's den.