Dr. Mohler writes of his initial skepticism about the forum:
Suffice it to say that I was not very hopeful about the Saddleback Civil Forum on the Presidency held at the California megachurch last Saturday night. In the first place, I am not really comfortable with the idea of hosting such a politically charged event in a church. No matter how the event is planned and projected, once the event starts it can turn into something far more politically volatile than planned. That is a truth I have learned by hard experience.
However, Mohler notes:
But. . the event turned to be quite worthwhile after all. I still have deep reservations about identifying the event so closely with a church, but the conversations really did get to urgently important and controversial issues, and Pastor Rick Warren handled the conversations with aplomb, demonstrating both civility and candor.
Mohler later responds to a (poorly argued) essay in today’s USA Today by DeWayne Wickham. Wickham maintains that Warren was “interviewing Barack Obama and John McCain…as though they were vying to be church vicar.”