WA State Gov. Inslee, with a religious tone in his voice, declared Wednesday that President Biden's new "climate crises" agenda gave him a "hallelujah" moment---a moment of hope.
He noted that we have now crossed the "desert of denial and deception," that our "children will be unshackled," and we are, apparently, entering a green new promised land.
Seriously. Has "Climate Change" become a new religion?
Be informed, not misled.
Inslee appeared on Wednesday's episode of CNN's "Cuomo's Primetime," praising President Biden's climate actions and addressing the claims that Biden is going to destroy a lot of jobs with his climate actions.
That has actually already begun. Workers on the Keystone XL Pipeline have already been laid off or notified they will be.
Cuomo asked:
"How do you finesse the aspect of the other party---on this, they've got a great angle. Every time you do something that is green, you're taking green out of their pockets. Keystone Pipeline, costing jobs. No more drilling, costing jobs. Jobs matter more to people than the environment when you look at the polls. How do you bridge that gap?"
Gov. Inslee explains that fighting climate change doesn't hurt jobs, the opposite is true.
Then Inslee delivered his sermon:
"Listen, the other side wants to shackle people to a past era of declining jobs. We do not want to shackle our children to dead weight jobs that are not going to exist 30 years from now. We want to give our kids the jobs that are growing, and this is---the number one job creation engine is clean energy."
In conclusion, he said,
"I couldn't be more tickled. Look, this is a 'hallelujah moment' from my view. We have crossed the desert of denial and deception about climate change and we have a president who understands how to create jobs and he's doing that bid time today."
We'll see how many net new jobs this president creates. But it was the religious fever of Gov. Inslee that caught my attention.
Climate change sounds like a religion.
In 2015, then-President Obama said, "Today our planet faces new challenges, but none pose a greater threat to future generations that climate change---as a nation we must act before it is too late."
At the time Lamar Smith wrote in the Wall Street Journal,
"Given that for the past decade and a half global temperature increases have been negligible, and that the worsening storms scenario has been widely debunked, the pronouncement from the Obama administration sound more like scare tatics than fact-based science."
At the time Rep. Smith (Texas R) was the chairman of the House Committee on Science, Space and Technology.
Smith said that "climate change" has become more of a religion than a fact-based science, noting that Rajendra Pachauri, the top scientist at the UN at the time, said in his farewell letter that "the protection of Planet Earth, the survival of all species and sustainability of our eco systems is more than a mission. It is my religion and my 'dharma'.
The rest of his article attempted to redirect climate change activists back to science, concluding that,
"The intellectual dishonesty of senior administration officials who are unwilling to admit when they are wrong is astounding. When asserting climate change, we should focus on good science, not politically correct science."
Seminary students hold worship service to plants---asking forgiveness.
"Today in chapel, we confessed to plants. Together, we held our grief, joy, regret, hope guilt and sorrow in prayer; offering them to the beings who sustain us but whose gift we too often fail to honor."
The Seminary explained why such a ritual was held for people supposedly preparing for the ministry.
They explained:
"We are in the throes of a climate emergency, a crisis created by humanity's arrogance, our disregard for Creation. Far too long we see the natural world only as resources to be extracted for our use, not divinely created in their own right---worthy of honor, thanks and care. We need to unlearn the habits of sin and death. And part of that work must be building new bridges to the natural world."
They said, "We must birth new theology and that means creating new spiritual and intellectual frameworks by which we understand and relate to the plants and animals with which we share the planet."
Urging churches to "turn from theologies that encourage humans to dominate and master Earth," Union says "we must birth new theology, new liturgy to heal and sow, replacing ones that reap and destroy."
The fall of Union Theological Seminary.
Affiliated with neighboring Columbia University in Upper Manhattan, Union became the nation's first independent seminary in 1893 when it severed its relationship with the Presbyterian Church after the denomination tried to oust one of its professors for claiming the Bible is not inspired by God, among other things.
One of Union's students was a German Pastor named Dietrich Bonhoeffer.
After escaping the Third Reich he came to teach in Union Seminary briefly in 1939. However, he soon became appalled by the liberalism, and progressivism of its students. Bonhoeffer wrote:
"They are completely clueless with respect to what dogmatics is really about. They are not familiar with even the most basic questions. They become intoxicated with liberal and humanistic phrases, are amused at the fundamentalists, and yet basically are not even up to their level."
He recalled that students "openly laughed at a a lecture on sin and forgiveness, and accused the seminary of having 'forgotten what Christian theology in its very essence stands for'."
Disillusioned, he decided to return to Germany, where, as most know, as a pastor he resisted the Nazi regime ultimately giving his life in a concentration facility for what he believed to be the work of the Lord---resisting Adolf Hitler.
We can only wonder how many others have left Union Theological Seminary, lost, confused, and misled.
When environmentalism begins to become a religion of sorts, it's a very small step to becoming the "fool" that Paul spoke of in the book of Romans: Chapter 1 (v21):
"Although they knew God, they did not glorify Him as God, nor were they thankful, but became futile in their thoughts, and their foolish hearts were darkened. Professing to be wise, they became fools and changed the glory of the incorruptible God into an image made like corruptible man---and birds and four-footed animals, and creeping things. Therefore God also gave them up to uncleanness in the lust of their hearts, to dishonor their bodies among themselves who exchanged the truth of God for the lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator."
Takeaway.
Stewardship and care of God's Creation? Absolutely:
Genesis 1:26:
"Then God said, 'Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, over all the earth and over every thing that creeps on the earth'."
Worship the creation, praying and repenting to it? Absolutely not.
Genesis 1:32:
"Who, knowing the righteous judgement of God, that those who practice such things are deserving of death, not only do the same but also approve of those who practice them."
Straight talk.
Be Informed. Be Vigilant. Be Discerning. Be Prayerful.