Conservative televangelist Joel Osteen on Thursday asserted that homosexuality was a sin and not "God's best" -- but at the same time, he said had not chosen to be straight.

During an interview on CNN, host Soledad O'Brien asked Osteen how he could claim to be uplifting LGBT people while also telling them they were sinners.

"It seems like in Christianity, sometimes we categorize sin," Osteen explained. "I mean pride is a sin, being critical is a sin, being negative is a sin."

"Those are all things you can change," O'Brien noted.

"I don't think it's God's best," the evangelist insited.

"You would say, the scripture says homosexuality is a sin," the CNN host noted.

"Exactly," Osteen agreed.

"When you're talking to your 45,000 people in your service and some of them are gay, you're saying to them, 'You're a sinner,'" O'Brien pressed.