c. 1998 Religion News Service

WASHINGTON _ American religious leaders split along generally predictable lines in assessing President Clinton’s performance during his recently concluded trip to China and the human rights comments he made there. Comments by conservative religious broadcaster Pat Robertson provided the only surprise.

Clinton’s nine-day visit ended Friday (July 3). While there, the president _ speaking to students at Beijing University and the Chinese public via a live television broadcast _ called personal freedom the”mandate of the new century”and a requisite for human and economic development.

Those and other such comments drew reluctant praise Tuesday (July 7) from the president’s Republican congressional opponents. Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott, R-Miss. _ while critical of Clinton for his remarks on Taiwan _ said the human rights comments should gain support in the Congress for the president’s effort to again gain”most favored nation”trading status for China.

American religious opinion on U.S. policy toward China is split.

Moderate and liberal groups tend to support Clinton’s belief that full U.S. engagement tempered by diplomatically acceptable criticism of the often harsh limitations Beijing imposes on religious and political freedoms is the best way to encourage greater democracy in China.

More conservative groups tend to be highly critical of White House China policy, saying trade issues have been elevated above basic human rights and that Chinese Christians who buck their government’s rigid rules on religious expression are among those most persecuted by Beijing. These groups have urged Clinton to be more forceful in his condemnation of Chinese policies.

Assessments of the Clinton China trip generally split along those lines.

For example, Victor Hsu, the National Council of Churches’ director for east Asia and the Pacific, called Clinton’s visit”quite successful.”The NCC, which has 34 mainline Protestant and Orthodox Christian member denominations, has consistently supported the president’s China policy, arguing additional confrontation would create a backlash in China that would most impact the very religious believers and political dissidents conservative critics say must be helped.”Whether one likes it or not, China is a major power with great influence in the world. It is very important for us to keep talking to China regardless of the issue,”said Hsu.”A policy of constructive engagement is best. There is nothing to be gained by second-guessing what the president might have said better.” Hsu said Clinton’s June 28 visit to a Beijing Protestant church for Sunday services”did a lot of good”for religious expression in China because”it showed the Chinese that this is not opposed by the government.” However, the Family Research Council’s Gary Bauer, one of Clinton’s most vocal conservative Christian critics, said the trip”overall continues a failed policy …. For example, during his televised press conference with (Chinese President Jiang Zemin), Clinton continually said `we feel one way about this and you feel another way.'”It had a tone as if there were only minor differences of perspective instead of major differences concerning the nature of man and where our liberty comes from,”Bauer said.

Bauer also insisted that the criticism leveled at Clinton by conservatives in advance of his trip prodded the president to say as much as he did about religious and political rights while in China.

The only agreement between Bauer and Hsu was over Taiwan. While in China, Clinton appeared to back away from longstanding U.S. commitments to Taiwan, although the administration has since said it did not. China regards Taiwan as a renegade province.

Both Bauer and Hsu, who was born in Taiwan, said Clinton had hurt Taiwan’s international standing.

Despite his frequent verbal attacks on Clinton, Robertson agreed with religious moderates on the president’s China trip, going so far as to criticize Bauer by name in a Wall Street Journal column. The column ran June 30, while Clinton was still in China.

Calling Bauer’s position isolationist, Robertson said it was”not moral, neither is it realistic. China is simply too big, too important and too powerful to wish away.”Robertson said”helping China reform from within”through full engagement is the”truly moral position.””Leaving a billion people in spiritual darkness punishes not the Chinese government but the Chinese people. The only way to pursue morality is to engage China fully and openly as a friend,”Robertson said.

In an interview, Bauer said he did not advocate isolating China.”This is not about isolating China, but about the terms of engagement with China,”he said.

DEA END RIFKIN