Rick Warren: Son Shot Self With 'Unregistered Gun'

Rick Warren's son committed suicide using an unregistered gun, the pastor said in a tweet yesterday. "Someone on the Internet sold Matthew an unregistered gun. I pray he seeks God's forgiveness. I forgive him," the pastor tweeted. An Orange County sheriff's rep says the gun's status isn't clear. "We can't tell if it's registered or not because the serial number is scratched off," he notes, per the AP.

"At one point in time, it may have been, but it's going to be impossible to find out." Federal law prohibits scratching off guns' serial numbers. California, meanwhile, requires background checks and gun registration. Though Warren's tweet will likely add more fuel to the gun control debate, his later posts discussed forgiveness, not guns, NPR notes. (More Rick Warren stories.)