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The heretics were never dishonest men; they were mistaken men. They should not be thought of as men who were deliberately setting out to go wrong and to teach something that is wrong; they have been some of the most sincere men that the Church has ever known. What was the matter with them? Their trouble was this: they evolved a theory and they were rather pleased with it; then they went back with this theory to the Bible, and they seemed to find it everywhere. ― Martyn Lloyd-Jones, Studies in the Sermon on the Mount (As quoted by Marsha West)

A new religion — if in 2022 it can still rightly be called “new” — has established itself in Western culture and seems now to be the official religion of the Federal Government of the United States, and our mainstream media, along with Wiccan and pagan groups — and popular culture. Although its government adherents do not call it a religion, it certainly carries all the earmarks of one. It is now lavishly funded by taxpayer dollars and enjoys mandated obedience through the power of Federal legislation. The priests of this mandated religion are climate change activists. We do not doubt that many of them are well-intentioned, deeply believing in the rightness of their cause, regardless of how this religion places heavy burdens upon ordinary citizens, who may or may not believe in their religion and certainly do not wish to destroy their children and grandchildren’s futures over their apocalyptic fervor. They followed a similar route to those Martyn Lloyd-Jones described concerning former religious heretics, but with a slight twist. These new religionists “evolved a theory and were rather pleased with it: they went out and seemed indeed to find it everywhere.” They have turned their theory into an iron-fisted belief system and have managed to establish authoritarian rule over entire nations and cultures that would make old-fashioned religious cults like the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society, Scientology, and others jealous.

Mark J. Perry might call this new religion an eco-pocalyptic religion. Its apocalyptic vision is slightly different from those of the past. Instead of preaching about God bringing judgment on humans, human beings are seen as wantonly destroying the goddess of the climate change activists — Mother Earth. The core doctrine is that humans are the thermostat that controls the climate of the planet on which we live. This strikes us as odd. When we were younger, changes in climate were normal; they were called “seasons.” We had summer, fall, winter, and spring. Some summers would be warmer or rainier than others. Some winters were much colder or snowier than others. We could sometimes witness quite a few years in a row when the climate was cooler or warmer than in past years. It varied depending on what was happening within the planet’s interior and solar activity.

Unknown to some people, there was a Mini-Ice Age from the early 14th century through the mid-19th century when “mean annual temperatures across the Northern Hemisphere declined by 0.6 °C (1.1 °F).” Part of that period was “The Year Without Summer” in 1816:

The weather in 1816 was unprecedented. Spring arrived as usual. But then the seasons seemed to turn backward, as cold temperatures returned. In some places, the sky appeared permanently overcast. The lack of sunlight became so severe that farmers lost their crops and food shortages were reported in Ireland, France, England, and the United States.

What had human beings done to cause such a catastrophic event? Was it coal-fired plants, diesel, gasoline-powered vehicles, or flatulent cattle? No, the culprit seems to have been a natural planetary occurrence:

The dust from Mount Tambora, which had erupted in early April 1815, had shrouded the globe. And with sunlight blocked, 1816 did not have a normal summer.¹“The Year Without Summer”

There were likely many such devastating eras of climate change throughout the countless centuries. Around the 1970s, or perhaps a bit earlier, a new belief was germinating in the minds of some climatologists. The habits of human beings cause climate change! We were personally exposed to their claims in the 1970s with dire warnings of a soon coming ice age that would cover the North American continent. Virtually everything North of Florida would be covered in ice! (Now, it should be noted that those of us who live in northern Illinois may occasionally feel as though winter will last forever, but evidentially, that is not what they meant at all.) In 1971 the Washington Post published “U.S. Scientist Sees New Ice Age Coming,” predicting the New Ice Age would arrive by 2020 or 2030:

The world could be as little as 50 or 60 years away from a disastrous new ice age, a leading atmospheric scientist predicts. Dr. S. I. Rasool of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration and Columbia University says

 Newsweek, April 28, 1975, published “The Cooling World” warning:

that the Earth’s weather patterns have begun to change dramatically and that these changes may portend a drastic decline in food production — with serious political implications for just about every nation on Earth. The drop in food output could begin quite soon, perhaps only 10 years from now.

As it turns out, these are but two of what are many false prophecies concerning the climate. In “50 Years of Failed Doomsday, Eco-pocalyptic Predictions; the So-called ‘experts’ Are 0-50”²Also see “10 Failed Global Warming Predictions That You Need To Know About” Mark J Perry notes:

1974: Space Satellites Show New Ice Age Coming Fast
1974: Another Ice Age?
1974: Ozone Depletion a ‘Great Peril to Life (data and graph)
1976: Scientific Consensus Planet Cooling, Famines imminent

Oddly, in the late 1980s, perhaps because the prophesied global cooling was failing to materialize, the direction shifted radically to the other extreme — it’s not global cooling that is coming to destroy us, but global warming!

1988: Regional Droughts (that never happened) in 1990s
1988: Temperatures in DC Will Hit Record Highs
1988: Maldive Islands will Be Underwater by 2018 (they’re not)
1989: Rising Sea Levels will Obliterate Nations if Nothing Done by 2000
1989: New York City’s West Side Highway Underwater by 2019 (it’s not)
2000: Children Won’t Know what Snow Is (they do)
2002: Famine In 10 Years If We Don’t Give Up Eating Fish, Meat, and Dairy

To sum up — in 1975, the climate eco-pocalyptic prophets issued a prophetic warning of famine within ten years due to global cooling. Then in 2002, they issued dire warnings of famine overtaking us in 10 years due to global warming, and they were false on both counts.

Here is how the average citizen in days of yore responded to gloom and doom climate forecasts: “Gee, that sounds kinda scary — we’ll have to see what happens.” And then they went on working and providing for their families, putting up Christmas trees, going to ball games and picnics, and otherwise living a normal everyday life. It never entered their minds to destroy their nation’s economy over it, or tax themselves into abject poverty, because, of course, that would FAR MORE SURELY end in starvation and death — which didn’t sound good to them. But we digress…

Now we come to the ever-popular High Priest of the Eco-Apocalypse, Al Gore, creator of the “documentary” “An Inconvenient Truth” in 2006, who predicted earnestly in 2008 that the Arctic would be ice-free by 2013! He, of course, had what the Watchtower would call “New Light” on these dire predictions and sadly was forced to postpone Eco-Armageddon, and the Inconvenient Truth had to be put off for a more convenient time.

Because of all their many inconvenient false prophecies, the Eco Prophets shifted tactics. They dropped both the global cooling and the global warming labels since they were just too specific, often embarrassingly so, and wisely replaced them with the amorphous name, “Climate Change.” With this shift in terminology, they can and do point to any climate-related event and call it evidence of the coming mega catastrophe, whether it be hot or cold. An unusual snowfall? Climate change. An unexpected drought? Climate change. More tornadoes this year than last year? Climate change. Colder or warmer weather than expected? Climate change. Even what we might consider perfect weather could be proclaimed a harbinger of doom. Fortuitously, Climate Change can be used to take the blame for the exact opposite of any of these conditions. No evidence is needed, of course — the assertion must simply be accepted. Any who ask for evidence are, labeled “Climate Deniers.” This is the equivalent to the Watchtower and other cults labeling questioners as apostates! They don’t need to stoop to refutation — they merely cancel any who disagree.

As we see it, the most crucial key to Climate Change’s conquest over any naysayers lay in taking control of the public schools’ curriculum. Starting in the first years of a child’s education, they have this religion’s terrifying beliefs drummed into their heads. Many of the young are scared half to death of a rapidly approaching climate apocalypse, and once indoctrinated, quite a few seem immune to any opposing views. This religion also permeates social media and most news sources and completely dominates Hollywood’s offerings.

Now, this is interesting: one of the more renowned climate change poohbahs, Michael Moore, executively produced Jeff Gibbs’s film, “Planet of the Humans.” Instead of being able to showcase the great strides made by climate change activism in the development of renewable energy resources to replace coal and oil, they were dismayed to discover just the opposite. The various attempts to save the world from pollution and catastrophe were just creating new and more inventive ways to pollute the planet. The film was released free on YouTube in 2020, but it was deleted on May 25, 2020. PEN America asserted it was censorship. To borrow a phrase from AL Gore, “Planet of the Humans” portrays a VERY inconvenient truth. Moore was highly disappointed. He still is a devoted follower of the religion of Climate Change, but, like Bill Gates and others, he has concluded the only real solution to the problem is de-population, which would require death on a grand scale. We can guess that they do not sacrificially plan to volunteer to be the first to go. We do not know if they plan to enact a “Let’s Kill Grandma” campaign or just to heavily nuke high-population nations, but we, of course, are against it.

Patrick Moore is the past president of Greenpeace Canada. He left in 1986 due to false environmental claims and scare tactics they were employing. In “Patrick Moore Revised,” he discusses many of the claims of Climate Change activists, including the false claims about the imminent extinction of Polar Bears. According to Patrick Moore, the Polar Bear population has grown from about 6,000 in 1973 to over 30,000 today. This interview is about 20 minutes long and well worth considering. Of course, Patrick Moore is labeled a heretic by climate activists, and you will find YouTube has posted a very convenient “Context” warning and a nice Greenpeace ad.

What is our response and responsibility? This is not simply a scientific or political issue. At its core, it is a religious worldview issue with two competing worldviews. On one side is the religion of man. Man is the current pinnacle of evolution and can control the planet, even its weather. No God need apply. It seems almost like a modern-day replay of the tower of Babel, only this time the planet is the tower, which they have all intentions of “building back better.”

On the other side is God and everything He has created. Hebrews 1:3 tells us He upholds “all things by the word of his power.” Human beings do have a responsibility towards God’s creation. In Genesis 1:26 and 28, God appoints His human creation (Adam and Eve) as stewards of the earth. At times humans have been and still can be bad stewards, carelessly polluting the waters and the air. Yet, much of Western culture has reversed and cleaned up those environmental issues. And, some of what the climate activists have pressed for are good things. With the use of DEF (Diesel Exhaust Fluid), diesel fuel emissions have been reduced to near zero. “New diesels can cut emissions faster than electric trucks, study says,” have cut exhaust soot up to 98 percent. Clean Coal technology has been developing over the past 30 years, working toward zero emissions. As the people of God and stewards of His creation, these are areas with which we should be educated and rightly concerned about. Our friend, Dr. Calvin Beisner, provides one of the most biblically sound and scientifically informed resources in this area of defense of the faith at Cornwall Alliance for the Stewardship of Creation.

Everything that has happened or will happen in the future is in the hands of Almighty God. He controls the weather — man does not. No man or group of men will wrest control away from Him, and He will have the final say. For our part, we must keep ourselves from hating others, even if we may find ourselves hated. Many of us born into earlier generations enjoyed the great blessing of being taught about God and true faith in our homes and churches. We were not sent out into the world without that faith in God underpinning us. In these times, people without God desperately need our love and prayers, especially the young, who do not have the tools to evaluate whatever information they are given. Please, let us pray for them.Ω

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