
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: TUESDAY, August 31, 1993                   TAG: 9308310093
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A6   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: From The Associated Press and Newsday
DATELINE: WASHINGTON                                LENGTH: Medium

CLINTON: SOCIETY TOO SECULAR

President Clinton told religious leaders Monday that political figures can be guided by their religious faith without threatening the constitutional separation of church and state.

"Sometimes I think the environment in which we operate is entirely too secular," Clinton said at a breakfast meeting with religious leaders from several denominations.

"The fact that we have freedom of religion doesn't mean we need to try to have freedom from religion, doesn't mean that those of us who have faith shouldn't frankly admit that we are animated by that faith, that we live by it and it does affect what we feel, what we think and what we do," Clinton said.

Saying he had pondered "these kinds of things" on vacation, Clinton said the root of many of society's biggest problems goes deeper than the policies of a secular world, such as gun-control laws.

"It's hard for me to take a totally secular approach to the fact that there are cities in this country where the average murderer is now under the age of 16," Clinton said.

"There certainly is something that is far more than secular about what is happening to a country where we are losing millions of our young people and where they shoot each other with abandon, and now often shoot total strangers for kicks."

The president urged Americans to approach their faith with "a certain amount of humility - that we be careful when we say that because we seek to know and do God's will, God is on our side and therefore against our opponent."

The president stressed that reforming the health-care system required "a conviction that this is in the common interest - that in the long run we will all win."

"If this becomes some battle where I'm trying to slay some dragon of special interests and that's all it is," Clinton said, "we will never get where we want to go."

As for the nation's economic ills, the president insisted that politicians must admit the country is "moving into a new age" in which nobody has all the answers and everyone may have to modify specific policy positions.

Clinton said the breakfast was a "new beginning" in which he and administration officials "rededicate ourselves" to helping Americans.

"I have felt in the last several months during my presidency that we oftentimes get so caught up in the battle of the moment . . . that sometimes we forget that we are all in this because we are seeking a good that helps all Americans."

by CNB