Reagan to Discuss Central America With Presbyterians

Concerned by a news report of Presbyterian opposition to his policies in Central America, President Reagan phoned his pastor at Bel Air Presbyterian Church recently to inquire about the denomination’s stance.

After discussing the situation twice with Bel Air Pastor Donn Moomaw, it was learned this week that the President agreed to what denominational leaders regard as a rare meeting in the White House with mainline church representatives who take issue with his policies.

Reagan will meet Wednesday morning with Moomaw, whose church he often attended before going to the White House, and seven Presbyterian clergy and lay people from a task force whose Central American recommendations were recently adopted at the denomination’s annual convention, church officials said. The White House confirmed the Wednesday meeting but gave no details regarding the session.

Approved Report

The General Assembly of the 3-million-member Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), meeting in Biloxi, Miss., on June 17 approved a report renewing the denomination’s call for the U.S. government to seek a political settlement in Nicaragua. The paper also urged the Reagan Administration to end both its assistance to the contra forces and its economic embargo against the Sandinista government. Church members were urged to register “moral opposition to current U.S. policy.”

Reagan was “concerned” about the Presbyterian stance and suggested to Moomaw that the task force that authored the report receive a State Department briefing, said the Rev. Gary A. Wilburn, associate pastor at Bel Air. Moomaw, now on a study leave, did not make himself available for an interview.

Moomaw, according to Wilburn, told Reagan that the 15-member task force had already been briefed by the State Department before they left for Central America.

“Donn was instrumental in arranging the meeting with President Reagan,” Wilburn said. The upcoming meeting was announced to the Bel Air congregation at Sunday services.

President and Mrs. Reagan attended Bel Air Presbyterian Church for years before he was elected President in 1980. Though Reagan has retained membership in the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), the denomination of his late mother, he has considered Moomaw his pastor and has remained in periodic contact with the minister.

Moomaw was not a task force member, but another Southern Californian is. The Rev. Gary Demarest, a La Canada pastor and a prominent theological conservative among Presbyterians, is now in Nicaragua on a humanitarian project and will fly to Washington for the White House meeting.

Leaders of mainline Protestant denominations have often complained that they have not had the access to the President such as enjoyed by evangelists and other conservative religious leaders friendly to the Reagan Administration’s social and foreign policies.

Nor was White House access available to the Presbyterian task force on Central America in 1982-83 or the 1986-87 group sent to update assessments of political, economic and social conditions there, said the Rev. Robert L. Brashear of Pittsburgh, a Presbyterian administrator who was a member of both task forces.

“Interestingly enough, we had the opportunity to meet with heads of state in Central America on both trips,” Brashear said.

In light of the Administration’s new peace proposal for Central America released this week, the church members’ meeting with Reagan next week “would appear to be a good opportunity for frank exchange and dialogue,” said Brashear, who will not be attending.

The Presbyterian opposition to U.S. policy in Central America is not new. The report approved in June by the Presbyterians’ annual convention “is nothing substantially different from what we have said before,” Brashear said. “We’ve had a pretty consistent line since 1983.”

In fact, the General Assembly adopted a more strongly critical resolution in June, 1985. It decried the U.S. policy in Central America as “not only ideologically misguided, politically mistaken, economically wasteful and militarily risky, but also morally wrong and unjust.” The resolution also asked the U.S. government in that June assembly to “stop all efforts to mislead the American people about the situation in Central America.”

Small Group Objected

A relatively small group within the denomination has objected to the General Assembly stances. The Presbyterians for Democracy and Religious Freedom, formed two years ago, argues that Presbyterian policy statements have been inconsistent in supporting “the Marxist-Leninist government” in Nicaragua and opposing “leftist” groups in El Salvador, according to the Rev. Ted Dorman of Escondido, a board member of the group.

Dorman said the organization has taken no position on whether the contra forces should receive U.S. aid. “We feel the church should be most concerned with violation of religious rights and persecution in Nicaragua,” according to Dorman, who said a General Assembly resolution last year maintained that there was no evidence of religious persecution.

Demarest, pastor of La Canada Presbyterian Church for 21 years, described his impressions on the Central American task force recently in church publications. Demarest said he went with five others to Guatemala as other teams went to El Salvador and Honduras. They were all together for six days in Nicaragua and for two days in Costa Rica.

Understanding Had Changed

After more than 40 meetings with a variety of church, government and other people, Demarest wrote that his understanding of Nicaragua, in particular, changed.

“The picture most consistently painted from here (in the United States) is that of a totalitarian, Marxist, repressive government, a base of Russian operations in our hemisphere, a threat to our national security. This was the major emphasis of our State Department briefing,” Demarest said.

“Having traveled in totalitarian countries, I did not experience the restrictions, limitations and attitudes characteristic of such situations. Other than in combat zones, there is complete freedom of movement, inquiry and conversation,” he said.

A spokesman for the La Canada Presbyterian Church said Demarest left Sunday for Nicaragua with his wife and two other church members and four parishioners from St. Bede Catholic Church in La Canada. They went there on a housing project sponsored by Habitat for Humanity.