WASHINGTON — Seeking to head off a confrontation with gay rights advocates, Senators Clinton and Obama each scrambled yesterday to release statements clarifying their positions on homosexuality to say they do not believe it is “immoral.”

The two leading contenders for the Democratic presidential nomination had initially ducked direct questions on the issue following the publication of comments by the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Peter Pace, in which he said “homosexual acts are immoral.”

After first saying on ABC News that it was “for others to conclude,” Mrs. Clinton released a statement acknowledging that the gay community did not like her answer.

“I have heard from many of my friends in the gay community that my response yesterday to a question about homosexuality being immoral sounded evasive,” she said. “I should have echoed my colleague Senator John Warner’s statement forcefully stating that homosexuality is not immoral because that is what I believe.”

Mr. Warner, the ranking Republican on the Senate Armed Services Committee, had already said he disagreed with General Pace.

The context of General Pace’s comments, made in an interview with the Chicago Tribune, was a discussion of the military’s “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy toward gays.

Mr. Obama issued a similar statement after Newsday reported yesterday that he had dodged repeated questions on the morality of homosexuality. “I do not agree with General Pace that homosexuality is immoral,” the Illinois senator said. “Attempts to divide people like this have consumed too much of our politics over the past six years.”

At least one major gay advocacy group, Human Rights Campaign, was satisfied by the two senators’ statements. “We told them that they needed to issue a crystal clear and unequivocal statement in response to the questions asked yesterday,” the organization’s president, Joseph Solmonese, said. He said the group was on the phone with the two campaigns “throughout the morning.” Based on their statements, he said, “we feel that is what they delivered.”

The exchange on homosexuality comes as gay rights supporters are also criticizing a radio host and columnist, Garrison Keillor, who wrote on Salon.com on Wednesday that if gay Americans want society to accept them as couples and parents, “the flamboyance may have to be brought under control.”