Pastor Warren has built a world-wide evangelical reputation, and lays claim to leading the largest congregation in the United States, the 22,000 member Saddleback Church in Lake Forest, California. He is also the author of "The Purpose-Driven Life," the best-selling non-fiction hardback book in U.S. history. The forum, which featured an hour with each candidate, was at his invitation and he was the congenial host of an event whose avowed goal is "to restore the church's primacy in society and not be off on the sidelines, to be a part of the world and all the issues." According to a church spokesman, "It's a way to use the platform that God has given Rick and the church to be a leader and bring everyone together, not have the church be over there and separate."

This is precisely where the arguments about separation of church and state in the United States begin. Those who take issue with the pastor's purpose argue that the founding fathers came to the U.S. to escape the tyranny of religion, not to re-establish it. They believe that a public and exclusively Christian question and answer session for presidential candidates comes very close to violating the establishment of religion clause contained in the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

Imagine, if you can, the Pope sponsoring similar conversations with John F. Kennedy and Richard Nixon in 1960. In that presidential campaign, Kennedy took great pains to assert that as president, he would not be taking his instructions from the Pope. Now, a half century later, both candidates rush to convey their religious views in some detail, under the guidance of a prominent Baptist minister as interviewer.

We can look at this in several different ways. It is certainly testimony to the pervasiveness of religiosity in U.S. public life. Organized religion is far more important and church attendance far greater in the U.S. than virtually anywhere else in the Western world. Religious morals rank among the most divisive political issues in America, most notably on questions of abortion, stem cell research, and gay marriage. Freedom of choice versus legislated morality has split the country ever since evangelical clout came to the fore in Republican politics a generation ago. On the other side of this divide, avowed secularists have succeeded in banning prayer from the public schools, and they fervently assert that politicians should keep their religious views to themselves, and Americans should just wake up and see where all this faith-based voting has gotten them.In the midst of all this, the chase for the votes of the faithful reflects the increasingly prominent and divisive role religion has come to play in American political life. No doubt arguments about the role of religion and whether presidential candidates should be baring their souls and their positions in nationally broadcast church extravaganzas will continue for a long time, but let's put those arguments aside for now and recognize that Rick Warren has performed a real public service. More than any of the panelists at the media-sponsored debates in the primaries, he asked revealing questions that each candidate had to answer or duck at his peril.

Senator McCain showed himself to be a remarkably good storyteller, and his crisp, staccato answers to policy questions provided clear and simple answers to how he claims he would act as president. His "My friends" folksiness wowed the audience, which comes from one of the most conservative districts in the U.S. Senator Obama had none of the instant answers that were McCain's hallmark, but he came across as thoughtful, sincere, and quite nuanced in his responses. More important than the marked differences in style, the two men took vastly different positions on issues ranging from America's role in the world to Supreme Court choices, abortion, energy and taxes. Their presentations underscored what we already know. This election will force Americans to choose between two very different visions of the U.S. role in the world and government's role at home.

Depending on which candidate you support, you might call McCain a straight shooter, or dangerously reckless. Similarly, you could view Obama as supremely wise, or as a hesitant wimp. We'll hear much more of this kind of name-calling in the weeks ahead, but there wasn't any name-calling in church Saturday evening.

Rather than indulge in mindless name-calling during this election campaign, Americans would learn far more about their next president if they read the transcripts of this remarkable presentation and discover what each candidate revealed and hid about himself and his policies. The transcript can be found on the web at http://rickwarrennews.com/transcript/.

Goldsmith is a former director of the American Institute in Taiwan's Kaohsiung Office, and author of "Jade Phoenix," a prize-winning novel of 1970s Taiwan that is offered in a Far East edition by Bookman Books Ltd. in Taipei. Goldsmith can be reached at syd.goldsmith@gmail.com.