Biker Church Brouhaha : Religion: A Baptist pastor in Lomita allows his building to be used by a congregation of recovering drug abusers and drifters, but neighbors object to the rock music and behavior of those who attend the Set Free Christian Fellowship.

By RANDAL C. ARCHIBOLD

Dec. 11, 1992 12 AM PT

TIMES STAFF WRITER

Here are a few of the ingredients fueling a neighborhood dispute in a secluded part of Lomita--bikers, hippies, New Age mysticism, the Rolling Stones, a Baptist minister, and the mysterious sneakers in Mrs. Laconfora’s bushes.

At issue are the goings-on at the First Baptist Church on Hillcrest Avenue. The church is used by the Set Free Christian Fellowship--a controversial Anaheim-based “biker church” that employs prayers sung to the music of the Rolling Stones and rap music to minister to drug addicts, drifters and others who say conventional churches have turned them away.

Good intentions, but not on our block, say some residents of Hillcrest Avenue. They say Set Free’s Saturday evening worshipers have urinated on lawns, slept in bushes, and have simply made too much racket. The residents are being led by their Neighborhood Watch captain, Adhyatma Bhagavan The Friend, a hippie and the spiritual leader of The Friend’s Way of Self-Realization, who lives with some of his followers across the street from First Baptist.

Hillcrest residents say they have had to chase away vagrants and drug dealers for 10 years and don’t feel that their leafy, sloping block at the foot of the Palos Verdes Peninsula is the place for weekly visits by more drug addicts--recovering or not.

“I love them and my heart goes out to them,” said Bhagavan, 49, who has a graying beard, shoulder-length hair and wears a peace emblem dangling from his neck. “You can love a guy with a butcher’s knife in his hand, but you don’t have to stand there and get cut up.”

That is tunnel vision, says Bob Colella, pastor of Set Free’s South Bay chapter.

Says the stout, gray-bearded and pony-tailed biker, 53, a cross and Star of David dangling from his ears: “Bhag may want to help the street people, but he wants to do it somewhere else. Pretty soon there won’t be anyplace else.”

The neighborhood battle began on the evening of Nov. 7, when Set Free held its first service at First Baptist at the invitation of the Rev. James Miller, the church pastor who had met Colella through other Christian groups.

“My goal is to allow this facility to be used by as many people as can use it and to let as many people know the good news of Jesus Christ,” Miller said. “They allow us to reach people we can’t reach.”

It was a shock to neighbors.

“I thought we were being invaded by Hell’s Angels,” recalled neighbor Penny Laconfora, who said service-goers have slept in her bushes--a dirty pair of sneakers were left behind--and on her driveway.

Capt. William Mangan of the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department’s Lomita station said Set Free has not been a police problem. Deputies responded to four complaints about noise and trespassers on two occasions last month, but no arrests were made.

He said recent complaints have concerned people arriving on the block after the Set Free service, knocking on doors and asking neighbors if they know where Set Free is located.

“That’s been kind of disruptive,” Mangan said. But he believes that neighbors and Set Free--which has promised quieter services and closer monitoring of its service-goers--eventually will grow to tolerate one another.

“Initially, what we heard was, ‘We don’t want “those” people there,’ but we told them we can’t dictate who comes in and out of the church,” Mangan said.

Neither can the Lomita City Council, council members agreed.

The council this week told neighbors to work out the problems themselves and offered to call in a mediator. Both sides said they don’t see anything to mediate.

This is not the first time Set Free has made waves.

Set Free was formed in 1982 by Phil Aguilar, a flamboyant former Baptist minister and ex-convict who urges followers to “get high on Jesus.”

Although praised by Anaheim civic leaders for his efforts at drug rehabilitation, Aguilar has come under criticism from dozens of former church members and others for his alleged overzealous rehabilitation methods. Aguilar has denied the allegations.

Former members said Aguilar tried to turn them against their families while they stayed at church-run drug rehabilitation homes, attempted to arrange marriages and mentally tormented them when they questioned his authority.

“I think Set Free is potentially dangerous, but not for the thousands who attend in a superficial kind of way,” said Ronald M. Enroth, a Westmont College sociologist and author of “Churches That Abuse,” a book published last spring that chronicles Set Free and other “aberrant Christian groups.”

“I don’t deny there are some good people associated with Set Free and some individuals are helped. But some that they help are just so messed up just about anything will help, and that’s the kind of person that is most vulnerable,” Enroth said. “It can be dangerous psychologically and spiritually.”

Colella shrugs off the charges as exaggerated and says Set Free’s methods worked for him and can help others.

Although fuzzy about his life prior to kicking drugs seven years ago, Colella said most of his 53 years were spent as a junkie.

He said he has been shot six times, but will not explain the circumstances.

His drug addiction tore apart his family, he said. Two wives left him, and other family members rejected him before he turned to Set Free. Since then, he has devoted his life to spreading the word about Christ.

Those who attend the regular Saturday services--roughly 40 to 50 people--say the music and uplifting sermons have helped them spiritually.

“It’s a little more radical with the live band on stage, but everybody is really loving and friendly, said Michele Cox, 25, who is fighting substance abuse. “Jesus is in control. He won’t let things get out of hand.”

Still, Bhagavan and his neighbors are not pleased.

Bhagavan’s religion, a blend of New Age mysticism, transcendental meditation and conventional religions that stresses the importance of “oneness with God,” teaches that choices must be made. And he has made his: Set Free is not right for his block.

Miller’s “spirit moves him to try to rescue the street people and my revelation moves me to try to save my middle-class neighbors from any pain,” said Bhagavan, who was born John Lee Douglass and grew up as a Methodist in Iowa.

“We are not people who are callous toward the homeless or the street people,” said Bhagavan, seated on the floor of the house he shares with five other followers. A placard reading, “Practice Peace and Love” hangs on a wall and the room is appointed with conga drums, keyboards and posters with quotes from Thoreau and Bhagavan’s teachings.

“The issue that moves me is the battle weariness of the neighbors. Sometimes anxiety can be a worse pain than the actual battle.”