Eighteen evangelical leaders, including the Rev. E....

Eighteen evangelical leaders, including the Rev. E. V. Hill of Los Angeles, presented their complaints about the Bush Administration directly to the President and his top staff aides at a White House meeting on Oct. 30.

“This was important because it was the first face-to-face meeting we’ve had with the President since he was elected,� Hill said.

Hill is pastor of Mt. Zion Missionary Baptist Church and was chairman of the Clergy for Reagan committees in the 1980 and 1984 campaigns. He said the evangelical group, which included Jerry Falwell, had not met with Bush since his 1988 campaign.

Leaders of the group, called the Conservative Evangelical Caucus, said they were bothered this year by invitations to homosexual rights activists to attend two bill-signing ceremonies at the White House and the Administration’s alleged lack of zeal in anti-abortion efforts and in seeking restrictions on controversial art funded by the National Endowment for the Arts.

The Rev. Richard Land, executive director of the Southern Baptist Christian Life Commission, told the President that “there has been serious erosion of support in the evangelical community for your Administration. There is a pervasive and deep-seated atmosphere of confusion, disappointment, distrust and some feeling of betrayal.�

Robert Dugan, Washington-based public affairs director for the National Assn. of Evangelicals, called for the resignation of John Frohnmayer, NEA director.

Dugan also presented the President with a proposed executive order that would require that “traditional family values� be upheld in all administrative, regulatory and agency decision-making. Group members also asked Bush to issue an executive order banning fetal tissue experimentation and a presidential proclamation on the sanctity of human life.

Administration officials present included White House Chief of Staff John Sununu and Leigh Ann Metzger, newly appointed special assistant to the President for liaison to evangelical groups.

Hill praised Metzger as having “a good grasp of the issues and an appreciation for who we are.�

Hill said he told Bush that in “the trenches� of inner-city work it can be hard for Republican supporters such as himself to defend Administration policies without having access to presidential aides.

* DATES

A daylong conference on synagogue art and architecture will be held Monday at University Synagogue in West Los Angeles, featuring workshops with artists and architects on all facets of synagogue design. Lawrence A. Hoffman of Hebrew Union College will give the keynote talk. The meeting, which starts at 9:45 a.m., has a registration fee of $20.

Vincent Wimbush, associate professor of religion at Claremont Graduate School, will give a free lecture on the Bible and African-Americans at 11 a.m. Monday at Chapman College’s Hashinger Hall.