Osteen on Labels

"There was a time where I thought I don't want to be known as "an evangelical" because at the time that meant you were a Republican that was against everything. I think that's changed. That was a few years back. I don't want people to look at me as their minister and say he's a Republican and he's against this, that and the other because my church is made of up of all different types of people. In some ways I would agree with that. That's again probably back to a belief my dad had that he didn't get political because he didn't want to divide the audience. I feel that same way. I don't want to be categorized. Our message is about spreading Christ's love to everybody. If you look at somebody and say he's against that or that or he's on that side, to me people start turning you off because of that."

Megachurch Pastor Joel Osteen in an interview with BeliefNet