Reply to Liar

Note of Explanation: This started out as a short response to a MySpace "friend request" (gladly accepted) from someone calling himself "liar2u ." "Liar" sorely attacked one of the companies I had listed in my bio there, as well as "michigans west coast hypocrits" [sic]. It was not my intention to refute any of that, since I'm not into online "pissing matches," but it did occur to me that something I had previously written (see I've become progressively more disgusted with religion.) could be similarly misconstrued by others. So an explanation of that seemed to be in order. My experience at the company in question was also much different than what Liar reported, so I felt inclined to share something about that also.

Hello Liar ~

About Thermotron Corporation ~

I worked at Thermotron for eight of its early years. It wasn't that way then. We were simple, happy, very successfully growing, but not very profitable. We were also not very shrewd or slick, so didn't have much choice other than openness and inclusiveness.

The owner was Chuck Conrad, who was also the company's founder. The good opinion of his employees was more important to him than money. I don't say that in praise. It was more a figment of his personality organization than a real desire to be thoughtful and nice, but it all came out the same anyway.

All of us Executive Committee members put together wouldn't have made one good manager. Thus, although very successful in terms of growth, technological and market leadership, and all that, we weren't making any money, and the bank finally threw in the towel when the debt began to exceed $2.5-million. At that point they forced Chuck to bring in some professional management talent. That was the beginning of the end for me, and I left a year and a half later to start my own business.

Not long after I resigned, Chuck sold a controlling interest in Thermotron to a holding company from Wisconsin. By virtue of their professional management talent, the company's financial situation quickly, and significantly improved. A few years after that, Chuck finally sold off his remaining share, and exited with a well-deserved $8.5-million. Over the years that followed, he donated large chunks of that to various projects in the Ludington area and elsewhere. He and I took a final nostalgic tour of the place on the day he received his final payment.

After Chuck's exit, I didn't follow the company's fortunes much. I was then doing business with their competitors, so they were not comfortable with the idea of my having access to any inside information. I did a couple of deals with them, but they were both unpleasant experiences, so I kept away after that.

Evidently you had a bad experience at Thermotron. I'm sorry to know that, but am aware that others also suffered some bad times there under the regimes that followed ours. On the other hand, there are others who survived and made out quite well, and I have often thought that had I been more mature, personality-wise and in a business sense, I probably would have fared equally well, and would be much better off in retirement than what I have to look forward to now. That's just an observation, not a lament.

On Evangelicalism ~

As for Larry Huch, I don't know anything about him or his organization. His approval ratings are low, but then so are Robert Schullers (A Hope College alumnus, by the way), whom I always thought was pretty much on the up and up. Meanwhile Jim and Tammy Faye Bakers ratings are high. Go figure! If you worked with the man, I'm willing to take your word for him.

I'm a Presbyterian (PCUSA); we're on the very liberal end of the reformed tradition. What I was alluding to in my commentary was the evangelical movement that's going on not only in our denomination, but elsewhere. Two things bother me about that. The first is a (supposedly) unquestioned acceptance of the Bible as the infallible word of God. The Second is the sometimes in-your-face or ostentatious sort of worship, witnessing and proselytizing.

The Presbyterian tradition has, up to now, emphasized learning, imparting knowledge and doing good in the world.

The emphasis on education arose from the idea that ignorance is not a good basis for faith, that the strongest faith is that in which the tenets are able to withstand scrutiny by wizened worshipers.

Some of what's in the bible is a mere recitation of history, as it was preserved for generations in the Jewish oral tradition. Why would any of that be need be considered infallibly inspired, and the word of God. Moreover, during the past three centuries scholars have studied the Bible and its various roots, and have concluded that in many ways it reflects the fallibility of its human writers and compilers, misinterpreting things, stretching facts and perhaps even making things up. An example is the often-quoted passage from John, where Christ supposedly said, "I am the Way and the Truth and the Life. No one comes to the Father except through Me." That's particularly disturbing to members of other traditions since, if true, that sort of leaves them out. I have a Vietnamese son-in-law who was naturally raised in the Buddhist tradition. We love him dearly, and the grandchildren he and our daughter had brought into the world. Am I to believe they are lesser in the eyes of God, and perhaps even doomed?

Many scholars doubt Christ ever said that, and as a simple matter of logic, so do I. Christians are a minority in this world, and I can't believe that God loves the child born to an earnest Jew, Muslim or even Buddhist any less than He does one born to someone professing to be Christian. Christ might well have said something on that order, but if He did, I'm sure it has been badly misconstrued - a costly mistake that, so far, has cost millions of lives because of religious intolerance and strife.

But this fallibility should come as no surprise to anyone with any common sense. We are all imperfect. Paul even acknowledged that of himself in his writings.

As for works, Presbyterians are famous for providing schools, colleges, hospitals, and similar social institutions where they have been sorely needed, and working for the less privileged around the world, as a means of demonstrating what real faith and the love exemplified by Christ looks like in action. Over the generations since its inception, thousands of "everyday saints" have generously given of their fortunes and put their hearts into all the good works the institutional church has done.

So when I see a movement that seems all too eager to take over, dumping that tradition simply because it is tradition, and without bringing anything of equal or better worth to replace it, I am disappointed. What the evangelical movement seems to bring is a lack of respect for the institutional church, bad music and ostentatious worship, with the belief that "talking the talk and walking the walk" makes one a real Christian, and that "good works" can be manifested by growing the congregation into a "mega-church," where thousands more can do the same.

At this point I'm suddenly hearing strains of the old We are One in The Spirit tune in my head. I guess there's also a version called They will know we are Christians by our T-Shirts, but I couldn't find a link to that. I thought I'd write up a witty, tongue-in-cheek lyric like that, but it's late, and I'm not really that cleaver.


[-=glw=-]