wfn.org | The religious community speaks out on

[John Rollins <rollins@intac.com>]

Clinton

98-2229
The religious community speaks out on
Clinton

by Kathryn McCormick
     (ENS)  As Congress, and later the public, reviewed
the prosecutor's report on his  affair with a White House
intern, President Clinton offered apologies and asked for
forgiveness.
          His most dramatic moment of contrition came
during a short speech on September  11 before more than
100 religious leaders gathered at a White House prayer
breakfast that  had been scheduled long before the House
of Representatives took its first official look at  the
report whose findings could lead to the president's
impeachment.
          "I don't think there is a fancy way to say that
I have sinned," Clinton told the  religious leaders-
Protestant, Roman Catholic, Muslim and Jewish. He asked
for  forgiveness and declared that he had repented,
adding that he acknowledged that he now  must also be
willing to give the forgiveness he seeks and to renounce
"the pride and the  anger which cloud judgment, lead
people to excuse and compare and to blame and  complain."
The reaction to the president's remarks was mixed: some
clergy sympathized with  his plea while others,
especially conservative clergy, remained skeptical.
     "To admit `sin' now, after having been caught by a
relentless prosecutor, cornered  by a grand jury, and run
out of delaying and obfuscating tactics clearly has not
persuaded  everyone of the sincerity of the president's
repentance," said Jim Wallis, a leading  evangelical who
founded the Sojourners community in Washington, D.C. "My
religious  mother (who voted for Clinton) put it this
way: `He didn't really repent, he just got  caught.'"
          But however the president finally works out his
actual repentance, Wallis added,  the rest of us might
think about some repentance of our own. Maybe we share
some of  the president's self-absorption, a feeling that
because we have won people's approval or  have gained
power and success we can avoid the consequences of our
actions, no matter  how reckless or selfish, he said.
          "There are lessons here for each of our lives,
families, and careers," he said.  "How could Clinton's
genuine repentance-and ours-begin to teach our nation
something about real spiritual values?"

Some call for resignation
Earlier, Bishop Richard F. Grein of the Diocese of New
York, Jewish Theological  Seminary Chancellor Ismar
Schorch and Herbert W. Chilstrom, former presiding bishop
of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, all said
they felt Clinton should resign  from office.
          "I think his moral presence in the country has
been undercut so badly that he can't  lead," Grein said
in an interview with a reporter from The New York Times
seeking the  opinion of clergy on the president in the
wake of the scandal. Grein told the reporter he  felt bad
for the president, the nation, "and for everyone else."
          In a separate interview with the same reporter,
Bishop Mark Sisk, who will  succeed Grein as bishop of
New York, said he thought that now was not the time for
a  presidential resignation. "The world is in a very
dangerous moment with a global  economic crisis and the
current Russian political emergency," he said in a
statement  released by the diocesan office, adding, "It
would be precipitous to have a sudden change  in
leadership at this time."
          According to the statement, both bishops
underscored their "deep concern for the  welfare of this
country, its leadership and particularly for those poor
and forgotten  persons who are easily overlooked by the
distractions of the current national scandal.
          "I respect, and hope that we will honor, the
plea of President Clinton for  forgiveness," Frank T.
Griswold, presiding bishop of the Episcopal Church, said
in  correspondence with church members who raised the
issue with him. "This is rooted in  my understanding and
experience of God's boundless compassion and mercy. I am
deeply mindful that all of us, in various ways, are
constantly in need of the grace of  forgiveness
ourselves."
          He added, "At the same time, I realize there
are very real questions about the  implications of the
President's actions for the symbolic nature of the Office
of President,  and the role of the President both as
leader of our nation and within the world  community.
These questions must be addressed carefully and
sensitively, and in a  nonpartisan manner, with the focus
clearly on what is best for our nation."

--Kathryn McCormick is the Episcopal Church's associate
director of news and  information.