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Tavis: I am pleased to welcome Gary Hart to this program. The former Colorado senator and Democratic presidential hopeful has also enjoyed a successful career as an author. His latest book is called "God and Caesar in America, An Essay on Religion and Politics.' Senator Hart, nice to have you on the set for the first time.

Gary Hart: Very great pleasure, thank you,

Tavis: I've seen you on the satellite feed, but it's nicer to see you in person.

Hart: Great pleasure.

Tavis: This is a really cool piece. I wanna, Jonathan, get this shot. This book is real, you see the front, but it's real small. A very thin book. It's not a real thick book. It's an essay, which is easy to read. And it's a short, to the point polemic. But when you say "God and Caesar in America, An Essay on Religion and Politics,' one question among many comes to mind.

Let's deal with that, and get it out the way right quick. You know the question. Gary Hart talking to me about God, religion and politics? Why Gary Hart?

Hart: I have a background in evangelical Protestantism. I grew up in eastern Kansas, in a small farming town, and was a member - my parents were members of the Church of the Nazarene, which broke off from the Methodists about a hundred years ago. I went to the Nazarene College, where I met my wife, and then to Yale Divinity School, where I graduated.

Before the Kennedy campaign in 60, I was intending to be a professor or teacher of philosophy and religion. And Kennedy came along and pointed out to my generation that we could be a public service. And I then went into law and government.

Tavis: I was gonna ask you, and I'm glad you answered it already. I was about to ask you why, with that kind of religious, spiritual, faith background, you decided to make the leap to politics. I definitely get that question in a contemporary sense, which we'll talk about in a second. But I was curious as to why you made that leap, and I think I get it now.

Hart: Well, I had no plans to be in politics. John Kennedy didn't say, run for office. He said, give something back to your country. Public service. And I thought that made a lot of sense. And I did not have any calling to the ministry, as such, even though my saintly mother very much wanted me to be a minister. But I did think I would be a teacher.

And as it turns out late in life, that's what I've become, after full circle. But I did want to go into government, provide some government service, and then see what happened after that.

Tavis: I could argue, though, as I've always seen it, because I expected to be in public office myself, when I was a kid growing up in Indiana, speaking of the Senate. What I wanted to be was the first Black Senate from the state of Indiana. I met Birch...

Hart: It's not too late.

Tavis: Yeah, well, Barack Obama's got that thing, and he's, I'll let Barack, he's Illinois, but right next door. (Laugh) I'll let Barack have that. This TV thing is working out okay, for the moment, at least. Of course, you never know, you could be fired tomorrow. But anyway, that said, I always thought of public service because of the people I was exposed to who were in it as a noble profession, and as a ministry in and of itself. Do you see it that way? Did you see it that way?

Hart: Absolutely. I think service, in fact, that's exactly what happened in my case. Service, I couldn't find a vocation or religious service other than teaching. But the Kennedy challenge opened the door to service to the public. And as I indicate in the essay, I was heavily motivated, and still am, by the teachings of Jesus.

Almost all of which are contrary to the current religious right, which is very judgmental, very divisive. Jesus was non-judgmental, and very inclusive. And in the famous, famous, I guess that's the wrong word. The well-known Sermon on the Mount, those he blessed were the peacemakers, the poor in spirit, those who hungered and thirst after righteousness. The merciful.

Tavis: The meek.

Hart: The meek. Exactly.

Tavis: I wonder how that you think it is - how do I wanna phrase this? That we got off track? How did we get off track? That is to say, how did we end up, do we now live in a nation where the people, to your point, at least, the way you see it, the people who are talking to us every day about Jesus. So many of these televangelists on the right are not true to what Jesus taught with regard to how we ought to live our lives?

Hart: Well, it's the central question of our time, at least politically, I think. First of all, I think you have to go back to the sixties. The infamous age of sex, drugs and rock and roll. And a lot of people concluded then that America was losing its soul. And as you know, starting with Jonathan Edwards and the Great Awakening in the 1600s, America goes through cycles of reform and renewal and evangelical reformation and revival.

And this is one of those. What distinguishes this one from the Billy Graham and Billy Sunday and Jonathan Edwards revivals is it's very political. And I think it became political over issues like abortion. And that's what triggered people on the religious right to think the country really was on the path to Hell, and they had to do something about it. And they did it through the Republican Party.

Tavis: Is that message, I could argue this either way, but forget me, this is about you. Is their message resonating, and one could argue that it is, is it resonating with America broadly across the board, or are they preaching - or is it resonating with a particularly vocal, but small, comparatively speaking, group of Americans?

Hart: Well, the answer is yes and no. For example, in my state, there are 80 separate organizations headquartered in Colorado Springs, Focus on the Family being the principle one, all of which are religious and conservative to right wing, and very active in the Republican Party in my state, and indeed the country.

And then you have the phenomenon of the community church. If you drive around the suburbs of Denver, any city, I think, probably Indianapolis, any other, you find community churches. They don't say Presbyterian, they don't say Methodist, they don't say Baptist. They're community.

Tavis: Nondescript, yeah.

Hart: Exactly. And they are seven days a week. They provide a social life for the young people. It's a social community meeting place. And they pack in thousands and thousands of people. And by and large, I wouldn't say exclusively, but by and large, they preach a doctrine or message of conservatism and participation in the Republican politics.

Tavis: This question, I'm trying to figure out how to phrase, this Senator, respectfully, 'cause I don't want to make this question sound tricky. But I'm curious as to what you think, if the Christian right, or if Republican Party, put another way, is a wholly owned subsidiary of the Christian right these days, if one believes that, what ought the Democratic response be to that? And it's a strange question to ask, 'cause I don't wanna...

Hart: I understand.

Tavis: Yeah.

Hart: Yeah. First of all, I think the current Republican Party is dominated by three forces, not just one. On the domestic agenda, it is the religious right. On abortion, the death penalty, oddly enough, in a so-called culture of life, and issues of that sort. The foreign policy is dominated by the so-called neoconservatives.

And the economic policy is dominated by tax cut Libertarians. So you have three groups, outside the mainstream of the Republican Party and the center of America, dominating the Republican Party. And they've energized it. In a way, they've helped provide the electoral majority, but on the other hand, they've demanded a huge sacrifice in policy terms for their support.

Tavis: Where are we headed, your essay is brilliantly written, I think. But where are we headed in this conversation? You've obviously added your voice to it, but where are we going with this conversation? Or not going, as it were?

Hart: Well, I didn't answer the second part of your question, which is what should Democrats do? First of all, I think we have to recapture the language. I have a chapter in the essay on the so-called faith and values, almost never defined. Whose faith, and what values? But in the Reagan years, and certainly in the George W. Bush years, the phrase faith and values has dominated the discourse.

And yet, the people who use those terms almost never define which faith and what values. Because when they do, they automatically alienate a group of people who consider themselves influenced by values, certainly core moral values, and some kind of religious faith. So it's inclusive terms used by people who mean them to are very exclusive.

Tavis: In the two minutes or so that I have left here, I hope you'll permit me to go off script here just for a second, and ask you a question that I think is instructive and informative, and probably even uplifting for our audience. When I think of this book, "God and Caesar in America, An Essay on Religion and Politics,' you can't have a conversation like this, obviously, as we have had here, without talking about the issue of faith.

I was at a town hall meeting the other night with my dear friend, Princeton Professor Cornell West. Dr. West made the point to somebody in the audience who asked a question that it's always better to see a sermon than to hear a sermon.

Hart: Interesting.

Tavis: Always better to see a sermon than hear a sermon. And I say that to you because I think that you are a sermon. Better to see a sermon than even to hear or read a sermon. And I'm fascinated by how it is that when you encountered something that many people would have allowed that to be the end of them, you've not stopped speaking, you've not stopped writing, you've not stopped appearing.

You found a way to still have a life that is fulfilling and worthwhile, and again, I think instructive and informative. How'd you do that? Have you done it? How are you doing it?

Hart: Well, that's worth a long conversation. The story that goes back almost 20 years was never accurately told. I think it was very poorly reported. The press behavior in the case of my alleged sins was over the top, and I think most journalists thereafter pulled back.

Tavis: But you still had to deal with it, though. Fair or unfair, you had to craft a life behind that.

Hart: Right. And it came out of my, whatever strength I have came out of my faith and my background, and I think the biggest sin is not using your talents properly. And I couldn't go on the sidelines and not be part of the debate. So I've continued to write and teach and try to add value wherever I can.

Tavis: I think there's a message in there for all of us, though.

Hart: Well, there's lots of messages. I've often told people running for office I can tell them what not to do. (Laugh)

Tavis: Yeah. (Laugh) Well, maybe those running for office, Gary Hart can tell you what not to do, but he can also tell you, with all due respect, what it is that we should be doing, or certainly ought to be talking about, if we are determined to make America a better place to live and work in. His new book is "God and Caesar in America, An Essay on Religion and Politics.'

It won't take you long at all to read it. And I think, as I said a moment ago, you will find this small polemic, this small text, both informative and instructive, by the former Senator from the great state of Colorado. Gary Hart, as always, nice to have you on the program.

Hart: Mr. Smiley, thank you.

Tavis: Mr. Smiley, wow. Any time you come back this way, you're welcome back. (Laugh) Calls me Mr. Smiley. Gary Hart, my man. Glad to have him in the studio. Up next on this program, from one best-selling to another, Anne Lamott. Her book is out in paperback now, a 'New York Times' bestseller. We'll talk to Anne Lamott in a moment. Stay with us.