CAMPBELL BROWN: Good evening, everybody, to our viewers in the United States and around the world. Welcome to Messiah College in Grantham, Pennsylvania. I'm Campbell Brown. Tonight, we bring you something different in this already extraordinary campaign year. We are calling it the Compassion Forum, an evening with the Democratic presidential candidates to focus on the issues of faith and compassion and how a president's faith can affect us all.
The focus tonight is to take the conversation beyond the candidate's standard policy points. And some of these questions tonight will be deeply personal. We are here before a distinguished, bipartisan audience of faith leaders from around the country, from the head of the Southern Baptist Convention to the head of Catholic charities to rabbis and lay leaders.
Before we get started, on behalf of CNN and the candidates, I'd like to thank the people behind tonight's event, Faith in Public Life, the ONE Campaign, Oxfam America, and, of course, our hosts, Messiah College. And I'd like now to introduce my co-host. Please welcome Jon Meacham. He is the editor of Newsweek and one of America's best-known writers of religion and matters of faith.
Welcome, Jon.
JON MEACHAM: Thank you.
BROWN: Tonight, we're going to spend about half of our time with Senator Clinton, about half of our time with Senator Obama. The order tonight was decided by coin toss. Senator Clinton won and has elected to go first. Questions will come from Jon and me and from some of the faith leaders assembled here in our audience, so let's get started. Without further ado, please welcome the senator from New York, Hillary Clinton.
BROWN: Nice to see you. Welcome.
HILLARY CLINTON: Thank you. Thank you very much.
BROWN: Senator Clinton, welcome to you.
CLINTON: Thank you.
BROWN: Jon has got the first question.
CLINTON: Great. Well, it's wonderful to be here. I want to thank Messiah College for hosting this. Very good of you to do this.
MEACHAM: Senator, we'll start with the news. You have been extremely critical of Senator Obama's recent comments in San Francisco in which he argued that some hard-pressed Americans have – economically hard-pressed Americans have, and I quote, "gotten bitter and cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or antitrade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations."
Senator, you have written of how faith sustained you in bitter times. Many of us have been sustained by our faith in bitter times. What exactly is wrong with what Senator Obama had to say?
CLINTON: Well, I'm going to let Senator Obama speak for himself. But from my perspective, the characterization of people in a way that really seemed to be elitist and out of touch is something that we have to overcome.
You know, the Democratic Party, to be very blunt about it, has been viewed as a party that didn't understand and respect the values and the way of life of so many of our fellow Americans.
And I think it's important that we make clear that we believe people are people of faith because it is part of their whole being; it is what gives them meaning in life, through good times and bad times. It is there as a spur, an anchor, to center one in the storms, but also to guide one forward in the day-to-day living that is part of everyone's journey.
And, you know, when we think about the legitimate concerns that people have about trade or immigration, those are problems to be solved. And that's what I think we should be focused on.
But I am very confident that, as we move forward tonight and beyond, people will get a chance to get to know each of us a little better, and that's really what I want to talk about. I will leave it to Senator Obama to speak for himself; he does an excellent job of that.
And I will speak for myself on what my faith journey is and what, you know, leads me to this chair here tonight.
BROWN: But, Senator, you've been out there on the stump attacking him pretty aggressively over this. And his response has been – and he said it pretty bluntly tonight – shame on you. You know that he is a man of faith. This is what he's saying. And to suggest that he is demeaning religion is you playing politics.
CLINTON: Well, he will have to speak for himself and provide his own explanation. But I do think it raises a lot of concerns and we've seen that exhibited in the last several days by people here in Pennsylvania, in Indiana where I was yesterday, and elsewhere, because it did seem so much in-line with what often we are charged with.