The American Spectator

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Eminentoes

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GLOBAL WARMING, AS AN ISSUE, is primarily a cause for wealthy and middle class professional people in North America and Western Europe, especially the latter, where green parties have compelled their governments to become outspoken. In part, the evangelical left's demands are an expression of guilt over that wealth. Reducing consumption becomes their atonement.

Here is the appeal for some evangelicals, anxious to escape cultural stereotypes, but still preoccupied by concerns about divine judgment. Christians are supposed to shun riches anyway, though too few actually do. But if hellfire will not persuade, maybe global warming will. Shun that SUV, or you will burn!

Scientists, especially on the evangelical left, have not typically befriended evangelicals. But strictly secular appeals in religious America are often not effective. And the old liberal religious establishment has become too diminished to be that helpful. Evangelicals, now comprising one third of America, offer the most potent political possibilities.

Rev. Joe Hunter, whose brief tenure as head of the Christian Coalition ended because of his zealous focus on global warming, explained at the press conference how this coalition will work. "They [scientists] have the facts we need to present to our congregations; we [evangelicals] have the numbers of activists that will work through churches, government, and the business community to make a significant impact."

According to secularist stereotypes, evangelicals are gullible. But will they believe that carbon emissions must be reduced by 80 percent to forestall an imminent extinction of one half the world's plant and animal life? This new coalition is hoping so. And judging by its assumptions and rhetoric, there is no room for compromise. According to Cizik, God's creation is being "progressively destroyed by human folly."

If nothing else, evangelicals will contribute plenty of biblically doomful and even Manichaean language to the debates over climate change.

topics:
Business, Environment, Global Warming