I went, for the first time, to the recent National Prayer Breakfast in Washington, D.C. and I had good reasons to be suspicious.

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I went, for the first time, to the recent National Prayer Breakfast in Washington, D.C. and I had good reasons to be suspicious.

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You might think of this week as Kay Warren's coming-out party. Her husband, Rick, who is perhaps the most celebrated evangelical pastor in the world under the age of 60, has long said that his commitment to solving the international AIDS crisis, culminating in the third global AIDS summit held at his Saddleback church in Lake Forest, Calif., this week, was initially her idea, and here she is, finally taking credit. Petite, blonde—"ordinary" is her description—Kay Warren has for 32 years played the role of nurturer, best friend and helpmeet. But for the past year Kay has been on the lecture circuit herself, preaching that Christians ought to apply themselves to the problem of AIDS, even though it raises uncomfortable questions about sex. This week her memoir, "Dangerous Surrender," comes out, and now Kay Warren has emerged at the center of things. Asked if she's comfortable in this new role—with the hustle and bustle and aides and assistants, her office resembles a senator's—she starts to cry. "I didn't see it coming," she says, sitting in a conference room in her suite of offices not far from Saddleback. "I never, ever saw it coming."

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When you walk into Trinity United Church of Christ on the South Side of Chicago, the first thing you see on a Sunday morning are the people crowding the lobby, hugging and kissing, asking after each other’s children. The congregation is older and formally dressed: many of the women wear fur coats, stockings and heels; almost no one is dressed in jeans. As an usher leads a reporter upstairs to the pastor’s office, he rebukes a young boy: “Take off your hat in church, son.”

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