ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1997, Roanoke Times
DATE: Sunday, March 9, 1997 TAG: 9703100099
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-2 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: WASHINGTON
SOURCE: MIKE FEINSILBER ASSOCIATED PRESS
Church leaders fear the president's suggestion that they help lighten welfare rolls may turn into a heavier burden.
Church leaders don't like to say no to the president, but that seems to be their answer to his plea to hire people off the welfare rolls.
``He knows better, his staff knows better, and his pastor knows better,'' said the Rev. John Steinbruck, pastor of Luther Place Lutheran Church, which feeds hundreds of people every week a few blocks from the White House.
``If every church in America just hired one family, the welfare problem would go way down,'' Clinton told 130 clergymen at an ecumenical prayer breakfast in the White House in January.
He also has said ``the problem would go away'' if churches prevailed on members who run businesses with at least 25 workers to add one person off welfare.
After the breakfast, the Rev. Joan Brown Campbell, general secretary of the National Council of Churches, which represents 33 denominations with 52 million members, said she cornered Clinton. While charity is in the grand tradition of the church, she recalled telling him, ``the church is also an institution that insists on justice, and that requires the government to be a full partner.''
LENGTH: Short : 35 linesby CNB