He cannot be sure that he will save his presidency, but the leader of the western world is currently doing all he can to ensure that he will save his soul.

Bill Clinton repents "There's no fancy way to say I have sinned"

While all the president's men are joined in battle on Capitol Hill, Bill Clinton himself has turned inward and sought advice from spiritual leaders.

Despite criticisms that his stream of public apologies has become a biblical flood the president is reported to have taken to the long road that leads to personal redemption.

The clergymen charged with ensuring that the president's approval rating will be enough to get him through the pearly gates, have now promised to be "tough" on Mr Clinton during the months ahead.

Long road to redemption: Clinton confronted over actions

Their promise comes after the president made an emotional public declaration to religious leaders at a White House prayer breakfast that he had sinned and had "a broken spirit but a strong heart".

The head of Mr Clinton's own Southern Baptist Church has already criticised the president but his new spiritual advisors said he was taking weekly counselling to comes to terms with his behaviour.

Rev Tony Campolo, the American Baptist pastor working with the president, said: "I am concerned about a man whose soul is in mortal danger.

"When we're down there with the president, we're not just going to walk in and do a 15-minute, 'how are you doing, here's a verse of scripture, a verse a day will keep the devil away'.

"We won't let him off easily."

Rev MacDonald: Tough love for president

Rev Campolo said he and Rev Gordon MacDonald of the Grace Chapel Protestant Church, Massachusetts, were taking an active approach to the president's pleas for help.

They said that the meetings they had held so far had been "difficult and confrontational".

Rev MacDonald said: "When a person asks you if you'd come in, and says, 'I want to be accountable to you,' he is opening the door for you to ask tough questions, to suggest disciplines which might mean a turn in the road, a changed kind of life.

"We have gone to the bottom with this man. We have said things that are very, very confrontative."

The clergymen said that the president had already lost his temper in the sessions.

Richard Nixon: It didn't work for him

"We have come on so strong that he ended up yelling at us.

"And that's when conversations become real."

The clergymen said that they were monitoring the president's progress and would "change this relationship" if they felt he was not being sincere.

But while cynics might say the spiritual counselling is nothing more than a public relations ploy, Mr Clinton will hope that it serves him better than that most famous of beleaguered presidents.