c. 1996 Religion News Service

(UNDATED) Three recent polls underscore the difficulty of determining just who is an evangelical and what he or she might think politically.

A study by the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press released June 25 found that 33 percent of white evangelicals were planning to vote for Bill Clinton, while 54 percent were planning to vote for Bob Dole. The study identified evangelicals by asking:”Do you consider yourself to be a born-again or evangelical Christian?” White Protestants who answered”yes”comprised 23 percent of the general population. Black Christians, including evangelicals, mainline Protestants and Catholics, were considered in a single category that comprised 9 percent of the population. Of black Christians, 81 percent said they would vote for Clinton and 5 percent plan to vote for Dole.

In a study done in July by the California-based Barna Research Group, 39 percent of”born-again Christian”voters said they would vote for Clinton, while 38 percent said they would vote for Dole. But evangelicals, which Barna considered a”sub-set”of the born-again population, favored Dole over Clinton by a three-to-one margin (55 percent to 17 percent).

Barna’s poll defined born-again Christians as those who said they have made a personal commitment to Jesus and believe they will go to heaven when they die. The poll said 38 percent of the population meets that definition.

The poll defined evangelicals as those who are born-again, but also believe that the Bible is totally accurate in its teachings. Overall, Barna said 8 percent of the population meets this criterion.

In yet another poll released Aug. 21 by Scripps Howard News Service and Ohio University, Dole was leading Clinton among white born-again Christians by 50 percent to 36 percent. The poll asked the question,”When it comes to religion, do you consider yourself to be `born again?'”Thirty-seven percent said they were born-again, including 61 percent of blacks and 34 percent of whites.

MJP END RNS