Officials’ Efforts Renew Woman’s Faith in America : Politics: City councilman and congressman work to help free new citizen’s brother, who was reported to be facing execution in Saudi Arabia.

Morena Moore felt so disenchanted with Americans after she moved to the San Gabriel Valley from the Philippines in 1985 that it took her seven years to become a U.S. citizen.

Now she flaunts the fact that she is an American.

Moore, who moved here because she had married an American, put her new status as a citizen to work recently in an effort to save her brother, who she believed was going to be executed in Saudi Arabia. The experience left her a strong believer in the American political system.

“People are getting so frustrated about the system, and here I found these great people who went out of their way to help me--on Christmas,” said Moore, 48, who describes herself as “a little person--just a housewife.” The people she was referring to were La Puente City Councilman Charles H. Storing and U.S. Rep. Esteban E. Torres (D-Pico Rivera) who intervened in her behalf.

Moore’s brother--Pentecostal lay pastor Oswaldo Magdangal--was imprisoned in Saudi Arabia for his religious activities in October and was widely reported in the international press to be facing execution on Christmas Day.

International human rights organizations and the office of Philippine President Fidel Ramos were already lobbying Saudi officials to spare Magdangal, but Moore did not find out about her brother’s situation until the evening of Dec. 23.

With 36 hours to go, she made a frantic attempt to contact elected U.S. officials who might intercede on Magdangal’s behalf. And she was astounded at the help she received.

It remains unclear whether international pressure forced the Saudis to cancel the execution and deport Magdangal, or whether reports of the impending execution were incorrect.

But one thing is certain: Moore, who lives in Valinda with her husband and 7-year-old son is now convinced that even people who feel disenfranchised from American politics can be heard and treated with respect.

“You always hear so much about how bad our political leaders are, but there are still people like Storing and Torres,” Moore said. “America is alive and well.”

After she contacted Storing, the councilman spent 30 minutes on the phone tracking down Torres. The congressman listened to Moore’s tale and requested a U.S. State Department inquiry into Magdangal’s situation. Magdangal was deported to the Philippines shortly afterward.

Saudi officials insist the press accounts of an impending execution were incorrect and that Magdangal and another Filipino who was active in the Pentecostal community in Riyadh, the Saudi capital, were never sentenced to death.

“They never received a sentence of execution. They were ordered by the authorities in Saudi Arabia to leave the country, and will be deported soon,” reads a Dec. 23 letter to Rep. Tony P. Hall (D-Ohio) from Prince Bandar ibn Sultan, Saudi ambassador to the United States.

Moore learned of Magdangal’s plight in a phone call from another brother in Georgia. The story was headline news throughout the Philippines, he told her.

“I started to scream. I started to go hysterical,” said Moore, who did not know that the London-based human rights group Amnesty International had taken up Magdangal’s cause in November and had sent out notices about the planned execution to its members on Dec. 22.

According to the Amnesty International appeal, Magdangal and another Filipino Christian, Renato Posedio, were arrested Oct. 15 after Christian literature was confiscated at Magdangal’s Riyadh home.

He had been an active member of the Pentecostal assembly in Riyadh and lay pastor for the group since 1988, the appeal said.

Open practice of religions other than Islam and proselytizing are forbidden in Saudi Arabia. In January, 1991, the Committee for the Propagation of Virtue and Prevention of Vice entered the villa where the Pentecostal group was meeting, arresting at least five members and confiscating materials, Amnesty International said.

Magdangal went into hiding after the January arrests. He was arrested in October because of his preaching activities.

Moore said Magdangal had lived in Saudi Arabia for 10 years.

Unknown to Moore, international organizations, including the National Council on Islamic Affairs, the Institute on Religion and Democracy, and the International Institute for the Study of Islam and Christianity, were also involved in efforts to spare the pastor, according to news accounts.

But in Moore’s mind, the burden lay with her.

“My brother (in Georgia) said, ‘If you are a citizen, call a congressman.’ I hadn’t even called him yet to tell him I got my citizenship,” said Moore, who was naturalized June 28.

So began her three-hour telephone ordeal.

Moore--a small, theatrical woman who talks with her hands and looks back on her hysteria with good humor--said she blurted out her story again and again over the phone, to operators and officials at the White House, the State Department, the West Covina police, and local radio and television stations, hoping to track down Torres.

She even recounted her woes to the wrong Mrs. Torres and a security guard at Channel 18 before they could tell her she was wasting her time.

Then she remembered a conversation she had two years ago with an elderly Filipino woman.

“She told me, if you’re ever in trouble, call Mrs. Storing. She helps Filipinos. And I thought, ‘Why would I ever need help?’ ” Moore said, doubling over in incredulous laughter.

Moore called Storing, who said he would try to help.

“I told her I would do my best to locate the congressman. I knew he was in the district, but I didn’t know where he was staying,” said Storing. “Suddenly a bell rang . . . ‘Gosh, maybe he’s staying at his daughter’s.’ I had to call all over to get (her) number. And that’s where he happened to be staying, and he happened to be home. It was just an act of God. And then the congressman took it from there.”

Torres said Moore identified herself as a citizen and began to tell the story, emotionally. It wasn’t until the end of the conversation that she realized she was actually speaking to the congressman.

“I had to reassure her, ‘Don’t worry, I’m the Congressman,’ ” he said.

“I guess things fell in place. It must have been that whatever pressures were brought to bear, worked,” said Torres. “It was a happy holiday for everybody.”

Moore’s mother called from the Philippines at midnight Christmas Eve and put Magdangal on the phone.

“He said he had lashes on him and he was coughing, but he was alive,” she said.

Moore said she had almost given up, but that her brother in Georgia had inspired her.

“The thing that my brother told me stuck in my head. ‘You are a U.S. citizen,’ ” Moore said.

Moore said she became disenchanted with the United States after she moved here. She decided to apply for citizenship only because she thought her parents and a son left behind in the Philippines might one day wish to join her here.

“Americans were made out almost like Gods in our minds, when I was growing up as a little girl in the Philippines. We were taught to love and respect Americans, that they were the most honest people,” she said. “I came here in 1985 and I realized it’s not true what I was taught. It was part of why I didn’t want to be a citizen.” She said people here were often rude to her in stores and in the streets.

“After this incident, my faith came back. I would like people to know we have good government leaders who went out of their way to help me.”