This article is written in response to an article published on the website of the US-based Institute for Creation Research, entitled Evidence for Global Warming.

11th May, 2007
NILS VON KALM

The Institute for Creation Research (ICR) recently published an article on its website on evidence for global warming. In my mind, the stance the ICR takes is extremely disappointing, not least because it goes against the overwhelming majority of evidence of the world's best scientists. To be still questioning whether or not the globe is really warming, let alone question that it is happening as a result of human activity, shows that the ICR is out of touch with the majority views of the evangelical and scientific worlds, and the Bible.

To state that "it will require a much longer period of record to be confident in any conclusions" is simply not true. The latest IPCC report, despite the ICR stating that it "reduced the alarmist rhetoric", actually states that the likelihood of global warming being caused by human activity is now 'very high', defined as a greater than 90 per cent likelihood, hence the greater urgency to take action now.

The ICR article shows that it is out of touch with the majority of evangelical opinion. It comes more than a year after the signing of a document by the National Association of Evangelicals in the US called the Evangelical Climate Initiative. The signatories of this document all agree that climate change is a real problem and that Christians have a Biblical obligation to be actively involved in dealing with the problem.

In addition to being out of touch with the rest of the evangelical community and being based on poor science, the ICR article is also based on poor theology.

It is poor theology to make a link between any benefits of global warming and what the climate was like in the Garden of Eden, as if this was the ideal for the whole world and that the rest of the world didn't matter. Scientists have indeed stated that there will be some areas of the world that will benefit from global warming, however these areas are in the very small minority. The fact is that global warming will overwhelmingly affect the poor through increased flooding, increased drought, creating climate refugees and collapse of some eco-systems. These are the very poor that God so passionately cares about and calls us, through the 2,000 verses in the Bible about the poor, to care about.

The poor theology in the ICR article is also highlighted in the following statement: "Earth has a stable environmental system with many built-in feedback systems to maintain a uniform climate. It was designed by God and has only been dramatically upset by catastrophic events like the Genesis Flood. Catastrophic climate change will occur again in the future, but only by God's intervention in a sudden, violent conflagration of planet Earth in the end times (2 Peter 3:1-12)."

The earth does indeed have many built-in feedback systems to maintain a uniform climate, however, despite it being designed by God, it is still being ruined by humanity. To state that catastrophic climate change will occur again only by God's intervention is also not true and is in direct denial of the current overwhelming evidence. It also shows an astonishing ignorance of humanity's capacity for sinfulness. Additionally, the statement that catastrophic climate change will only occur again as a result of God's intervention implies that we need not take action now and thereby denies the dignity of the creation that God made and said was good.

Articles such as that by the ICR threaten to undermine the good and Godly work that many Christians are doing in response to the Biblical call to be good stewards of the creation that God has so kindly allowed us to live in.

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