Tim thinks I exaggerate Rick Warren's role in the presidential forum Saturday night. He's not, as Tim suggests, just some pastor who decided to invite the presidential candidates to a forum at his church, and somehow got them to accept. He's one of the most influential evangelicals in America, according to virtually every measure of such things, and the candidates agreed to go to his church because they recognize that he's got enormous status.
The problem with that is why Warren, and not a rabbi? Why Warren and not a non-evangelical? Why didn't Warren invite an interfaith panel of religious leaders to pose questions? Why did he get to decide what all the important questions were? The fact that the candidates agreed to the forum on Warren's terms shows they've acquiesced to his status and how his event could, as Warren's own post-forum press release put it, "change the face of American politics."
Update: In his post, Tim wrote that "no one anointed" Warren, "he just held a debate and invited candidates to come." I didn't mean to suggest that Tim doesn't think Warren is an influential figure. I just meant to highlight that by accepting his invitation, and by agreeing to terms that were set up by Warren and Warren alone, the candidates were acquiescing to him being the arbiter of what the important political and theological questions are (and that it's proper to pose theological questions to political candidates in the first place).
--Sarah Posner
