Reno, discussing the killing rampage Wednesday night at a Baptist church in Fort Worth, Texas, said, ``The thought of gunfire in a place of worship should be inconceivable. But for families, for others last night, the inconceivable became a reality.''

She made the remarks at her weekly news conference.

Discussing a host of shooting episodes around the country, including one in Atlanta, and a host of shootings at schools earlier in the year, the attorney general said that FBI agents are on the scene and assisting local authorities. ``We are prepared to assist in any way that we can,'' she said.

A gunman identified by police as Larry Gene Ashbrook of Fort Worth burst into a church service and opened fire. Seven people were fatally shot, and the gunman killed himself.

``In 1999 alone,'' Reno said, ``we have watched as innocent people were gunned down while attending school, while walking home from a church or synagogue, while playing at a summer camp, while working in their offices, while delivering mail and now while worshiping in their church.''

``This morning, we have ... many more questions than answers,'' she added. ``We will search for those answers and try, as another community mourns its dead, to find a way to end this type of senseless and destructive violence.

``It is going to require the commitment of all Americans to look at the issue of how we handle guns, of how we deal with mental illness, of how we deal with hate,'' she said. ``We don't know what the situation is here, but all of these events cry out for America to come together and to address them in an effective, permanent manner.''

She renewed her call for legislation the Clinton administration has been seeking in Congress to place tighter curbs on handguns.

``I would hope that people would look, not just at what handguns have done to America this year, not in the context of this case, but what handguns have done to America over the last many years,'' Reno said, ``and that this nation would listen to its people who again and again cry out for ... asking government to make sure that we take reasonable steps to ensure that guns are not placed in the hands of people who are not lawfully entitled to have them.''