David Suzuki comes out swinging at Christians
Never one to be left off the fashionable left-wing bandwagon, David Suzuki has come out swinging at Christians, just as the rhetoric against them is heating up in the United States. Like many of the left-wing talking heads south of the border, Suzuki is blaming Christians for stifling science and pretty much being at the root of the world’s ills.
The State of Tennessee, for example, passed a law that allows teachers who don’t believe in evolution or human-caused climate change to challenge existing scientific theories. Yes, students should be encouraged to think critically and to question everything they are taught but, given the current political climate in the U.S., this is likely to lead to misinformation.
I’m only going to briefly comment on creationism, since most liberals seem to think that the modern Christian has the scientific understanding of a dung covered, illiterate 14th century peasant. It has been reduced to such a straw man argument, that it’s a waste of time to point out that current Christian theories ranges from intelligent design, to God simply initiating the big bang and evolution following naturally.
But notice what is insinuated when he lumps global warming and evolution together. Not only does he imply that only an uneducated country bumpkin could disagree with either of these theories, but he also goes on to say that students should be free to question everything they are taught – but we really can’t trust them to. The political climate might make them believe something other than what the left wants to indoctrinate… I mean teach them about global warming.
In the article, David Suzuki really holds most of his criticism for the current GOP candidates. You can practically feel the disdain dripping from the words he writes about Rick Santorum. Not only does Santorum dare to question global warming, but he also challenges the other sacred cows of the left – abortion and gay rights.
Rick Santorum just seems out of touch on every issue, from rights for women and gays to the environment. He’s referred to climate change as a “hoax” and once said, “We were put on this Earth as creatures of God to have dominion over the Earth, to use it wisely and steward it wisely, but for our benefit not for the Earth’s benefit.”
That statement is in keeping with the Cornwall Alliance’s Evangelical Declaration on Global Warming, which has been signed by a range of religious leaders, media people, and even some who work in climate science, such as Roy Spencer, David Legates, and Ross McKitrick. It says, in part, “We believe Earth and its ecosystems — created by God’s intelligent design and infinite power and sustained by His faithful providence — are robust, resilient, self-regulating, and self-correcting, admirably suited for human flourishing, and displaying His glory. Earth’s climate system is no exception.” It also states that reducing atmospheric carbon dioxide and fossil fuel use will “greatly increase the price of energy and harm economies.”
But you know what? Recent research from people who are labelled deniers by the global warming faithful, is showing that many ofearth’s systems are more resilient than previously thought. Can it be that the global warming cataclysm predicted by the left, is actually based on poor assumptions and badly flawed climate models?
And of course there is still time in the article to smear Stephen Harper’s scary, and suddenly fundamentalist Christian, Conservative Party.
Lest we get too smug in Canada, we must remember that we have politicians who hold similar religious views and are just as anti-science, although Canada has so far managed to keep religion largely out of politics. But recent cutbacks to government scientific research and staff show that many of our leaders also believe that the environment should take a back seat to corporate interests, and that any science that gets in the way must be hushed up or discredited.
Whether they justify it with religion or political ideology, it still doesn’t make sense.
Many on the left continue to claim that the conservatives have started a war on women, and question why they would alienate such a large voting block. But you don’t have to look hard to see that it is actually the Democrats and Liberals that are maligning an entire religion.
I won’t be so dramatic as to say that there is a war on Christianity, but it’s becoming clear that the left seriously does not like Christians. In they past they took the time to mouth platitudes in support of Christians, and droves of them – Catholics especially voted for them. But with the recent actions of the Democrats, and the continuing push against Catholics by Obama’s administration, that could be changing in the near future.