Full Transcript: Exclusive Obama Interview

It is a member of the United Church of Christ, which is a 99 percent white denomination. And so the church gets visitors constantly from other UCC members. And if you talk to them, they would always tell you that this is a welcoming, diverse church.

So, in that sense, it was a caricature. Now, what I also said was that Rev. Wright is somebody who, for all his good qualities, is somebody that I've had strong disagreements with for a very long time, but he's somebody who helped to introduce me to my Christian faith. He is somebody who married Michelle and I. He baptized our kids.

He was on the brink of retirement during the course of this year when some of these very offensive comments came to light, which isn't to say that I hadn't heard him say controversial things before, things I didn't agree with before, but nothing that was so visceral and incendiary.

And my point, I think, was that you don't disown certainly the church, but you don't even disown a man simply because he says something that you profoundly and deeply disagree with. At least I wasn't in -- that is not something that I would have been comfortable to do. What I can do is condemn the man -- condemn the words, but not condemn the man.

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MORAN: Well, let me press you on that. If I went to a church where white supremacy was preached, what would you think of me?

OBAMA: Well, but, see, I disagree with you, though, Terry. That's not what's preached at Trinity. And that, I think, that is an easy equivalence that is not at all what is taking place there.

If you look at the sermons, even the most offensive ones that are at issue, he is condemning white racism, as he defines it, but he is not condemning the white race. He is not suggesting that blacks are superior. What he's saying is, is that this -- that white racism is endemic in the society.

Now, that's something that I disagree with and I said in this speech today. And it's reflective of, I think, an anger and bitterness that is part of the black community's experience. It is a legacy of our past that isn't going away anytime soon. But in each successive generation, it hopefully lessens its grip.

And he has, in some ways, he has reason to be angry and bitter. I mean, here's somebody who grew up in the '50s and the '60s. He's gone through things that you and I never went through.

And so I think what was revealing in this whole episode was the degree to which I think large portions of white America were shocked or surprised that a lot of black people are still really angry about slavery and Jim Crow and segregation and discrimination, absolutely.

And I pointed out in the speech, that anger isn't necessarily healthy. In fact, often times it's self-destructive. More often, it is internalized in all kinds of ways. I mean, that's part of what we see in the inner city, where that anger and bitterness is turned inward, and kids shoot each other and take drugs and end up in jail sometimes.

Sometimes it expresses itself outwardly in ways that are offensive to the larger community. You remember when, during the O.J. trial, there was a similar moment when the culture -- you know, black and white culture just had these completely opposite reactions and nobody understood it.

And, by the way, I'm somebody who was pretty clear that O.J. was guilty. And I was ashamed for my own community to respond in that way, but I also understood what was taking place, which was that reaction had more to do with a sense that somehow the criminal justice system historically had been biased so profoundly that a defeat of that justice system was somehow a victory.

Now, that is an example of how unproductive that anger is and how we have to get beyond it, but it's there. And so that's why I said during the speech, in some ways for me to completely disown Rev. Wright is for me to disown the African-American community, because he embodies all the contradictions.

You know, this is why, during the course of this campaign, there have been moments where people say, "Well, I like Barack Obama, but not Al Sharpton. I like Colin Powell, but not Jesse. I like Oprah, but," you know, those of us who are African-American don't have that luxury.

And so what I can do then is to say, "Here's what I believe. Here's what I think. Here's where I think America needs to go."

MORAN: What do you mean you don't have the luxury?