Sunday, January 28, 2007
Global Warming - What Evangelical Christians Fear
The report in Washington Post about Mr. Frosty Hardison of Seattle and his battle with the Federal Way School Board is an example of the paranoia of fundamentalists. They will not let anyone or anything rob them from Armageddon. Be prepared for a loud whooshing sound when they go up to heaven. On second thought, the rest of us on earth might not be in a state to hear it.
While President Bush appears to be softening his opposition to global warming, Mr. Hardison stands firm.
Hardison, a parent of seven here in the southern suburbs of Seattle, has himself roiled the global-warming waters. It happened early this month when he learned that one of his daughters would be watching "An Inconvenient Truth" in her seventh-grade science class. No you will not teach or show that propagandist Al Gore video to my child, blaming our nation -- the greatest nation ever to exist on this planet -- for global warming," Hardison wrote in an e-mail to the Federal Way School Board. The 43-year-old computer consultant is an evangelical Christian who says he believes that a warming planet is "one of the signs" of Jesus Christ's imminent return for Judgment Day. |
The school board rolled over without much of an argument.
It drew following comments from KC, a friend:
i guess what makes this story sad is that this is not happening in Backwardscreek, Alabama or Ridiculoso, Kansas; this story is set in Seattle, for crying out loud. The protagonist is not a gun-toting moonshine-maker but a software programmer living in one of the bluer parts of the country. The inconvenient truth is not that the glaciers are melting, that is inconvenient only to the stupid people; the inconvenient truth is that stupidity has no professional or geographical boundaries. But what I really really dont understand is that if you are someone who "believes that a warming planet is "one of the signs of Jesus Christ's imminent return for Judgment Day", then where is the inconsistency with Gore's film? Isn't the Gore film simply saying that the end is neigh ? Gore's film predicts global disaster coming off the evil of mankind; passages in the Book of Revelations, which is the basis for all the Judgement day hoopla, says there cometh a Judgement day due to the evil in men's hearts. Where is the inconsistency ? Gore's film makes the further point that, though late in the game, if men wanted, they could forestall global distaster. Is Mr.Hardison afraid men's actions could thwart God's plans ? Hell, the God I believe in takes no shit from man. He is all powerfull and just an all round cool dude. If Mr.Hardison has such little faith in the power of his God over the will of man, then maybe he should shift his allegiance to mine. |
"Bigotry is the sacred disease" -- Heraclitus 6th Century BCE
