Pope meets with Clinton in St. Louis

Wildcat File Photo Arizona Daily Wildcat Associated Press Pope John Paul II and President Clinton clasp hands as they leave the stage after they addressed the crowd in St. Louis, yesterday. The pope arrived in St. Louis for his fifth visit to the U.S. mainland.

St. LOUIS - A president living through a modern morality play met yesterday with the spiritual leader of the world's Roman Catholics. But Pope John Paul II was more concerned with what he termed a ''time of trial'' for American culture than the impeachment trial against President Clinton.

The pontiff also made oblique reference in prepared remarks to the errant U.S. missile attack in Iraq, which he had condemned through a spokesman a day earlier, but he dropped them from his speech before delivery.

Looking frail, the 78-year-old pope walked slowly into an Air National Guard hangar draped with blue curtains where he met the president and Hillary Rodham Clinton.

Some members of the welcoming committee, which included Clinton Cabinet and White House staff, and state, local and church officials, knelt to kiss the pope's ring. His left hand trembled as he held the gold cross hanging from his neck.

Clinton praised John Paul for his efforts to promote peace and compassion for the less fortunate around the globe with ''a boundless physical energy which can only find its source in limitless faith.''

At the close of a century Clinton said had seen ''much suffering, but which ends with much hope for freedom and reconciliation,'' the president honored John Paul for his past stands against communism and his defense of human rights from Africa to the Balkans.

''People still need to hear your message that all are God's children, all have fallen short of his glory,'' Clinton said. ''All of the injustices of yesterday cannot excuse a single injustice today.''

The pope, likening the current debates over abortion and euthanasia to the fight against slavery and racism over the past century, said, ''America faces a similar time of trial.''

''Today, the conflict is between a culture that affirms, cherishes and celebrates the gift of life, and a culture that seeks to declare entire groups of human beings ... considered 'unuseful' to be outside the boundaries of legal protection,'' he said.

Today's visit marks the fourth time Clinton has met with the pontiff, and the first since the Monica Lewinsky scandal became public and led to the Senate impeachment trial.

Clinton was meeting with the pope for 45 minutes after a welcoming ceremony at a St. Louis airport hangar. White House officials said Iraq, Cuba and human rights were on the agenda.

The pope didn't mention Iraq directly during the welcoming ceremony, but his prepared text referred to ''rejecting violence.''

''To choose life,'' the speech read, ''involves rejecting every form of violence: the violence of poverty and hunger, which oppresses so many human beings; the violence of armed conflict which does not resolve but only increases divisions and tensions.''

The pope has been critical of the U.S. strikes and U.N. sanctions against Iraq, and he did so again Monday following a U.S. missile attack in southern Iraq during which civilians were killed.

The pope also has criticized the economic embargo against Cuba.