Saddleback Saturday

So tonight McCain and Obama will meet at Saddleback Church, where Pastor Rick Warren will moderate a two hour long session, and allegedly they will meet in the middle. Obama is scheduled to go first, and McCain apparently will not be able to hear his answers.

I'm not sure whether I'm more horrified or fascinated. Actually, I'm pretty sure I'm more horrified, although peversely I'll probably end up watching it--at least for as long as I can. This is blurring church and state lines a bit too close for comfort for me, and I'm suddenly reminded of a reversal of Constantine convoking the Council of Nicea in 325 in order to have the various Christian bishops arrive at an ecumenical consensus around the nature of the relationship of Jesus Christ to God. In that case a secular power summoned the religious authoritiy figures to decide 'once and for all' a matter of great religious import (and one which was causing divisions that were threatening the stability of the empire, as I understand it). Today a religious power figure invites (summons?) secular authority figures to answer questions--I don't dare to assume what they will be--but I imagine around faith and also around the increasingly voiced concerns of the 'evangelical' world--poverty, HIV/AIDS, war, the environment and torture among others.

Based on their responses to these questions, they will be evaluated by hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of voters. Given that they have yet to meet in an official debate forum, and given the press around this event, this event could have the same impact a debate would have on the public, but it distresses me that this will be taking place in a church. Don't get me wrong, I suspect it will be an interesting discussion, but I wish it could take place in another setting, even if Pastor Rick Warren still were to moderate it. But to do it in the church subconsciously sets the church up as a forum, and authority, for examination of secular candidates, (who belong, by the way, to a country of immense religious pluralism), in a way that I can't help but feel is not part of the mission of the church originally founded by Christ.

At some level I appreciate the dialogue that Pastor Warren is attempting to start. But I also have my misgivings about the type of thinking around faith and politics that such an event may legitimize. Let's see what happens...