U.S. President Bill Clinton who is now on a nine-day state visit to China went with his family to the Chongwenmen Church downtown Beijing on June 28 to attend Sunday morning services.

Clinton is the second incumbent U.S. president to have visited the church following George Bush who attended services here during his 1989 China trip.

Built in 1870 and renovated several times, Chongwenmen Church was Beijing' as well as north China's earliest Protestant church. Today, as every Sunday, more than 2,000 Protestants came to the church for the service.

Upon their arrival at the Gothic-style church at 9:25 a.m. local time (1:25 GMT), the president, his wife Hillary and their daughter Chelsea greeted the pastors and some of the congregation with warm handshakes. The Clintons then sang psalms and read the Bible with the rest of the congregation.

Pastor Wu Wei, who rendered the service today, gave Clinton a Bible, a collection of psalms and a cassette that records psalms, all in Chinese.

In a brief message, Clinton conveyed his belief that all Christians should seek unity with people of different races, backgrounds and creeds in different parts of the world, and "the Chinese and the American are brothers and sisters as children of God."

After the one-and-half-hour service, the Clintons talked with the pastors and other believers.

President Clinton and his family left the church around 11:00 for the Forbidden City, former residence of China's imperial families. They are scheduled later today to tour China's most famous landmark, the Great Wall.

China's Protestant population grew from more than 100 in 1840 to 10 million in 1997. There are more than 12,000 Protestant churches across China. Beijing, with about 30,000 Protestants out of its 13-million-population, has eight Protestant churches.