An autopsy today confirmed that the 27-year-old son of Saddleback Church Pastor Rick Warren died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound.
![(Flickr/All About God)]()
(Flickr/All About God)
Matthew Warren died about 10 a.m. Friday Apr. , Jim Amormino of the Orange County Sheriff’s Department said.
Sheriff’s deputies were notified about 5:30 p.m. that day.
The family was making funeral arrangements today, Kriston Cole, a spokeswoman for Rick Warren, said.
Matthew Warren was found dead in his home in the 25000 block of Pradera Drive in Mission Viejo.
“Today (Friday), after a fun evening together with (Warren’s wife) Kay and me — in a momentary wave of despair at his home — he took his life,” the pastor said in a letter to his staff.
Rick Warren is a major figure in the American evangelical movement.
He hosted a discussion between President Barack Obama and his 2008 Republican challenger Sen. John McCain and said the invocation at Obama’s first inauguration.
Warren founded Saddleback, which is one of the top 10 largest churches in the country.
He rose to fame with his bestselling book, “The Purpose Driven Life.”
Evangelist Greg Laurie, an organizer of the Harvest Crusades, said he also “had a son die, so I have a sense of the pain Rick and Kay are facing.”
The Newport Beach resident’s son, Christopher, died in a traffic crash in 2008.
Matthew Warren was the youngest son in the family.
“Only those closest knew that he struggled from birth with mental illness, dark holes of depression, and even suicidal thoughts,” Rick Warren wrote in a a statement released by Laurie. “In spite of America’s best doctors, meds, counselors and prayers for healing, the torture of mental illness never subsided.”
The post Officials confirm son of pastor Rick Warren shot and killed himself appeared first on SWRNN.