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PASTOR GENERAL'S REPORT, JUNE 3, 1983
PAGE 8
own for many years, but I still had doubts. The literature I
received from you was like the missing parts of a puzzle. Now
everything is falling into place nicely and I am, at last,
getting a complete picture.
W.S. (Sarasota, FL)
Last Sunday, sitting alone in my hotel room, I turned on the TV
merely to hear another voice while working on some legal papers.
Here in Connecticut the weather has been as miserable as every
day's headlines. Your lecture was a sparkling ray of sunshine
and hope. Thank you very much.
ON THE WORLD SCENE
Mrs. J.O. (Blackrock, CT)
--Richard Rice, Mail Processing Center
ALL SMILES AT THE SUMMIT--BUT PROBLEMS PERSIST Earlier this week I had the
opportunity of heading back to the East coast for the nurpose of attending
the ninth annual free world economic summit (Mr. Ken Giese, pastor of the
Richmond Church accompanied me) as well as conducting several interviews in
Washington, D.C. (accompanied by Mr. Richard Frankel, Washington Church
pastor)
Regarding the summit, the present moderate upswing in economic fortunes
throughout much of t}:le Western world virtually assured that this year's
seven-nation Summit of Industrialized Nations would be a success. There
was to be no major confrontation, such as the crisis over East-West trade
which doomed the previous summit in Versailles.
With hopes renewed that the gloomiest clouds of the recent recession were
at last lifting, the leaders of the U.S., West Germany, Japan, Britain,
France, Canada and Italy pledged to keep up the fight against inflation and
to back off--for now at least--from the brink of an all-out trade war.
The general consensus among the 3,000 or so journalists gathered at the
Williamsburg, Virginia summit site was that the "winner" was the host head
of-state, President Ronald Reagan. The TIMES of London correspondent said
that the conference marked the occasion "when President Reagan emerged as
an international leader of stature, finally managing to shed his cowboy
image."
With the U.S. obviously in the position of being the "locomotive" of re
covery, the other leaders were in no position to rock the boat. Widespread
predictions that there would be loud complaints over continuing high inter
est rates in the u.s.--a contributing factor to the strength of the dollar
over the other currencies--failed to materialize.
Not that frictions over this issue have faded far into the background. Im
mediately after the summit, the beleaguered French franc plummeted against
the dollar once more. Anticipating this development, U.S. Treasury Secre
tary Donald Regan repeatedly stressed at the summit his belief that the
real problem is not with a strong dollar but with lack of confidence in the
French currency due to President Francois Mitterrand's persistence in pur
suing costly socialist programs.
It may indeed have been "Mr. Reagan's Summit." For the first time, the U.S.
chief executive found a healthy majority of support for his policies--on