December 2010
I am a very emotional man. When I discovered that Canadian Christians, working in institutions which I served on various levels, openly ridicule Climate Change and deny the findings of thousands of serious scientists, I was deeply upset.
Here is some undeniable stuff. 2010 is on track to be the Earth’s hottest year on record, and here’s the math: 98 climate scientists out of 100 tell me that our constant carbon emissions means disruptive climate change this century. Two out of 100 call this nonsense. Fundamental Christians tell me to bet on the two.
Suppose society combats climate change anyway, the sensible thing to do of course. This means that we’ll have slightly higher energy prices but cleaner air; we’ll have less sickness but more renewable energy; the Saudis will have less money but we’ll have more innovative industries. If the deniers are wrong and we do nothing, our kids – many in Christian Schools – will meet the sudden stop at the end. The Lie has won, at least until the Lord comes back.
There’s a Dutch saying, which translates something like this: “even though the Lie is fast, competing with Truth it’ll come in last.” Mark Twain a century ago said something similar, “A lie can travel halfway around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes.”
Take the (mostly church-going) Republicans, now calling the tune in US congress. Last year, when John Boehner, of Ohio, the incoming House Speaker, was asked by ABC’s George Stephanopoulos about his party’s plans to address climate change, he replied: “The idea that carbon dioxide- our car exhaust – is a carcinogen, that it is harmful to our environment, is almost comical.” John Shimkus, of Illinois, one of four Congress members now vying for the chairmanship of the House Committee on Energy and Commerce, at a congressional hearing in 2009, dismissed the dangers of climate change by quoting Genesis 8:22: “As long as the earth endures, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night will never cease.” He added, “I believe that’s the infallible word of God, and that’s the way it’s going to be for His creation.”
I fail to see how these words explain the absence of Global Warming. Romans 8 is more relevant: “we know that creation has been groaning as in childbirth.” Revelation 16 reveals that “the sun was allowed to scorch the people with fire. They were seared by the intense heat.”
So why is it that sincere Christians label Climate Change a “politically correct ploy” and dismiss it as a fiction?
Ninety percent of the large fish in the oceans are gone; in parts of the oceans there’s six to ten times as much plastic as phytoplankton; there’s dioxin in every mother’s breast milk; rates of extinction are a thousand times faster.
I know, I know. I hammered on this before. The key is awareness precisely because we are talking about God’s creation, reason why every Christian, each in his/her small way, should be in the forefront of the fight against Climate Change.
That is also the opinion of E.O.Wilson, who Time magazine calls one of the world’s great naturalists. In his National bestseller, Creation, Dr Wilson, himself a son of the South, appeals to a Southern Baptist pastor for counsel and help, and suggests that they set aside their differences to save Creation – living Nature – which is in deep trouble.
He- and I also – expresses being puzzled that so many religious leaders have hesitated to make protection of the Creation an important part of their teaching. He knows the Southern Baptist ‘rapture’ bias, and debunks it as blasphemy, calling that concept not “gospels of hope and compassion, not born of the heart of Christianity, but gospels of cruelty and despair. Pastor, tell me I am wrong! ……..At the very least, Pastor, I expect we agree that somehow and somewhere back in history humanity lost its way…… We destroyed most of (creation) in order to improve our lives and generate more people.”
He writes that the natural world is embedded in our genes: a view of natural environments leads to a decline in moods of fear and anger and generates an overall feeling of tranquility; post-surgical patients looking out at trees, recover more quickly and report less need for pain and anxiety medication than those only see walls of buildings. No wonder: creation has God’s name written all over it.
Looking for a New Year’s resolution? Start a book club and make this easily read book – only $10 – your first topic of discussion.
Bert Hielema is a member of such a club, this month discussing Douglas Coupland’s Player One; what is to become of us, the latest in the CBC Massey Lectures.