Global Warming
The New Dogma

I have spent the majority of my professional life practicing environmental law. When I attended law school, environmental law was the new kid on the block. A course on this new, emerging legal issue was introduced my middler year. Little did I know that I would be involved in more litigation involving environmental issues than any other. I spent 25 years trying cases representing industrial clients…known as “polluters” to the press and enforcement agencies.

In the early seventies when there was increasing pressure for more legislation regulating the bituminous surface mining industry, many in the industry thought this was just a passing fancy. They could not have been further from the truth. Environmental protection is part of the warp and woof of our society. Being “green” is a socially sound ideal. The December 2006/January 2007 issue of Plenty: It’s Easy Being Green, pronounced:
Someday historians may look back at 2006 and decide that this was the year when environmentalism became a mainstream American movement adopted by people of all political persuasion, businesses small and large and churches both progressive and conservative.

While I have never objected to environmentally sound public policy, I do take issue with the dogmatism of environmentalism. [As a Christian, I wonder about the claim that the church is involved in a “mainstream American movement”. Doesn’t the church have its own movement to foster? But, that is a discussion for another time.] Environmental policy in this country is not decided by fact or science but by emotional appeals and pre-determined assumptions.

Take for instance, global warming [gw]. It is the new Darwinism. It is to be accepted as the latest gospel of environmentalism and it is heresy not to believe that it is happening and that the consequences of gw are dire. You are a right wing moron or ignorant backwoods nitwit to not be a believer in the catastrophe of gw. As one who keenly follows the environmental movement, I was interested in the November climate report from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s National Climate Data Center in Asheville, NC. NOAA reported for the second straight month that America saw below normal temperatures.

After a record warm Jan to Aug, Oct combined with Sept’s lower than average temperatures to drop the year from the warmest on record to the 3rd warmest from Jan to Oct. The warmest Jan thorough Oct occurred 72 years ago in 1934. Just in the 1970’s there was concern of the new Ice Age but in the last 30 years the greenies have been trumpeting a warmer earth because of increased greenhouse gas emissions. Well, this seems to belie that conclusion. Doesn’t gw mean the globe is warming…increasingly each year. This does not seem to be the case.

Interestingly, these recent findings have been largely ignored by the mainstream media. The electronic and print media have shown themselves to “true believers” not shaken by contrary evidence. Maybe we should call the NOAA findings “inconvenient facts”?! Some might say “this is just America, not the world”. But, is not America part of the world and it is a warming of the whole globe that is being touted. And, is not America the chief culprit in gw? So, should it not be warming faster than the “cleaner” places?

In an era when truth is relative, gw joins evolution, smoking, race, homosexuality and gender issues as those where there is truth that must not be compromised or rejected. Challenge the notion of gw and you will not experience the tolerance touted as the virtue of the age. Instead, you will discover a narrow mined bigotry of the kind Bible believing Christians are accused. During the next few weeks we will examine this multi-faceted issue from its science to the response Christians need make to gw, the new dogma.