The Intimidation Factor. Charles Redfern

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СКАЧАТЬ to press the issue of justice for the poor in the developing world, working hard behind the scenes to craft an official NAE statement on climate change.”34 Anderson’s pastoral style seemed the right prescription for a stunned organization laboring under a recent leadership humiliation—and it fit with the NAE’s gentlemanly and lady-like ethos.

      Calamity struck again in 2008. National Public Radio’s Fresh Air host, Terry Gross, asked Cizik a question in an on-air interview: “A couple of years ago when you were on our show, I asked you if you were changing your mind on that. And two years ago, you said you were still opposed to gay marriage. But now as you identify more with younger voters, would you say you have changed on gay marriage?” Cizik waffled: “I’m shifting, I have to admit. In other words, I would willingly say that I believe in civil unions. I don’t officially support redefining marriage from its traditional definition, I don’t think.”

      This went too far those who believe we should insist on the Church’s traditional teaching on sex (I’m among them). Cizik apologized for his comment and re-affirmed the NAE’s official stance, but it was too late. He stepped down from the NAE.

Christianity Today interviewed Anderson immediately after Cizik’s resignation. He said NAE officials should speak for the association, not for themselves. When asked about Cizik’s climate change advocacy, he replied: “’For the Health of the Nation’ does state that creation care is one of our priorities. It does not state in that document that we have a specific position, because we don’t, on global warming or emissions. So he (Cizik) has spoken as an individual on that. However, to most of our constituents, marriage and related moral issues and of greater importance and significance than specific stances on the climate.”35

      The question hovers: “But is it right?” Does the Bible prioritize family moralities over others? Did you, Anderson, not sign a statement underscoring the moral imperative entwined in climate change? Post-interview quarterbacking is easy (and let’s shout “take two” on Cizik’s NPR conversation), but we’re left with that vague “opportunity lost” feeling. Reel back the tape. Say this: “The NAE has no formal position on climate change, but Richard was educating us and I’m on record as agreeing with him. I hope the education process can go on.” No doubt some would have screamed for Anderson’s professional head so they could line it up on Cizik’s platter, but aren’t mega-church pastors writing books on courageous leadership? Did NAE heroes like Luther, Calvin, and Wesley—or founding President Harold Ockenga—poll their constituents? Haven’t evangelicals always claimed that truth trumps popularity? Otherwise, Ockenga would have fawned before Henry Emmerson Fosdick and Carl Henry would never have written The Uneasy Conscience of Modern Fundamentalism.

      Perhaps the NAE ailed with the same malady once infecting me: Conflict avoidance in the guise of resolution. Many in its institutions and churches offer courses in communication and negotiation in an attempt to quell their internecine battles. Such efforts are laudable, but they can lead to unintended consequences: Argument (the process of defending a viewpoint by marshaling facts in a quest for the truth) is deemed intrinsically bad. Suddenly, we’re nomads in the labyrinth of passive aggressiveness, choked by stilted “I statements” and confined by the tyranny of the sensitive. And, for the sake of “unity,” absurdities gain the respect of actualities. Imagine representatives from the Flat Earth Society and the American Astronomical Society sitting at the same table while Luther withdraws his 95 Theses because he did not validate the bishop’s feelings. Meanwhile, bullies see concessions as weaknesses: The Flat Earthers pound the table, yield nothing, display offense when the astronomers show photographs of a round planet, and demand a wider audience. The sad fact is that enemy-centered, antagonistic parties do not play for win-win resolutions.

      More on that dynamic later. Suffice it to say that such has been the scene in the debates over climate change and creation care: The deniers kept at it while the moderates demurred, darkening discussions over national policy.

      For instance . . .

      A few samples of denial in Christ’s name illuminate the underlying dynamic.

      Sample One: In 2009, Republican US Rep. John Shimkus of Illinois read from Genesis 8:21–22 in a hearing of the Energy and Commerce Committee: “Never again will I curse the ground because of man, even though all inclinations of his heart are evil from childhood and never again will I destroy all living creatures as I have done. As long as the earth endures, seed time and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night, will never cease.” Then a passage from Matthew 24: “And he will send his angels with a loud trumpet call, and they will gather his elect from the four winds, from one end of the heavens to the other.” The Congressman interpreted: “The earth will end only when God declares it’s time to be over. Man will not destroy this earth. This earth will not be destroyed by a flood . . . I do believe that God’s word is infallible. Unchanging. Perfect.”

      I applaud Shimkus’ reverence for God’s Word. I’ll also point out that most credible scientists are not predicting the earth’s destruction or humanity’s extinction. They are, however, forecasting droughts, weird weather, and rising sea levels—all of which expand the possibilities of calamity.

Shimkus also said this: “Today we have about 388 parts per million [of carbon dioxide] in the atmosphere. I think in the age of the dinosaurs, when we had most flora and fauna, were probably at 4,000 parts per million. There is a theological debate that this is a carbon-starved planet, not too much carbon.”36

      Sea levels in the dinosaur era were 550 feet higher than today’s. Much of the modern United States was under water.

      Sample Two: Shimkus was at it again in 2012, when Mitch Hescox, President and CEO of the Evangelical Climate Network, testified before the House Energy and Power Subcommittee on the merits of Environmental Protection Agency regulations aimed at reducing mercury pollution from coal-fired plants (research indicates that one in six children are born with threatening mercury levels). Hescox stood on a solid consistent life foundation, which places the protection of the unborn within a broader pro-life context: All human life is sacred, from conception to the grave—which means curbing mercury levels is a pro-life issue. “Let’s not endanger our children with a substance we can control,” said Hescox. “We must protect the weakest in our society, the unborn, from mercury poisoning.”

Shimkus responded by reading a statement from the Cornwall Alliance web site: “The life in pro-life denotes not quality of life but life itself” and only refers to “opposition to a procedure that intentionally results in dead babies.”37 Senator James Inhofe (R-Oklahoma) employed the guilt-by-association tactic: “I find it extremely ironic that Rev. Michell Hescox and the Evangelical Environmental Network think that the pro-life agenda is best aligned with a movement that believes there are too many people in the world, actively promotes population control, and sees humans principally as polluters.”38

      Apparently, Senator Inhofe was unaware that the US Conference of Catholic Bishops also supported the regulations.

      Sample Three: The Family Research Council had already impugned Hescox and the EEN when it claimed the organization “has received funding from such liberal groups as the Rockefeller Foundation, and specific signatories are beneficiaries of the largesse of far-Leftists like George Soros and Ted Turner” (Hescox denied that charge). An FRC e-mail issued a dire caution: “Since the beginning, factious people and religious cults have tried to infiltrate, divide, deceive and delude us (Ephesians 6:10–13).” So EEN is suspect.

      I cry to the FRC: Why are you so sure you have not been seduced, deceived, and deluded?

Sample Four comes from Mark Tooley, president of the Institute on Religion and Democracy. While dazed Philippine survivors picked through debris of Typhoon Haiyan, he inaccurately blogged on November 13, 2013: “Much of the worst hysteria about apocalyptic Global Warming has cooled, especially after more than СКАЧАТЬ