Preaching: The use of preaching to seek to achieve political and social change dates back to the earliest days of American history. Clearly it has been one of the dominant themes in your ministry. How has that impacted your preaching to have such a major emphasis on cultural and political confrontation?

Falwell: To be a salt & light preacher does put you in confrontation from time to time. There are places where I would never be invited to preach, simply because of the fear they might have that I might address the abortion issue, the gay issue, faith and family issues, but it is what I feel definitely called to do. So it is irrelevant to me that there is a price to pay.

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My Mars Hill ministry is a ministry to the media — Crossfire, 5, 6, 7 times a week I will do national TV shows. I do Hardball each Friday night debating somebody on some issue. It's my way of getting the gospel out to what I call the greater public. The greater public is not a church on Sunday morning and it is not listening to religious broadcasting on television or radio. A primetime debate forum for me is a way to get the gospel — the death, burial, resurrection of Christ — message out to people while confronting the other side on the moral and social issues. The positive side to that is that through the years about five million faithful, conservative, mostly Christian families have come along side and have asked me informally to be their spokesperson. So I am speaking for that politically incorrect minority of a few million people who don't have in the media another spokesperson with a possible exception of a Sean Hannity or George Will from time to time.

Preaching: Have you ever felt pressured or drawn to move more fully into that sphere and not continue in the pastoral role?

Falwell: No, I watched people make that mistake. I watched Carl McIntyre make that mistake a generation ago, and Billy James Hargis and some others. The primary ministry any preacher of the gospel has is just that, preaching the gospel. But for me a significant part of my ministry is confronting the culture. While I have no intention of running for public office or leaving the pastorate of the local church ever, I feel strongly that I must do what I am doing.

Preaching: As you look at other preaching in churches across the country do you think that pastors do enough of that kind of cultural confrontation in their own preaching ministries?

Falwell: I would have to say, I do not. I believe that we all have a different calling in some areas; each of us is unique. At the same time I don't think that anyone is exempt from being salt of the earth, and when you come to the premier social issue of our time — i.e. legalized abortion — I don't think that any person who takes the Bible seriously has the luxury of being silent on this issue. I think we shall stand with bloody hands if we do. But, again, I am not hard on other preachers who are less vocal. Everyone must do what he feels God is calling him to do.