The humanitarian issue of climate change
Climate change is a far more contentious issue than it should be, especially in the evangelical Christian community.
I understand why. Talk of climate change has been a centerpiece of left-wing politics and neopagan environmentalism for decades. And its obviousness to the average observer is often overstated; if you’re like most people, you probably haven’t noticed a major change in the weather over the course of your life. If you had snowy winters and hot summers in 1975, you still have snowy winters and hot summers today.
On top of that, the messaging about climate change in the US is notoriously irresponsible and ineffective. Whether it’s the president calling climate change a “hoax” or a Congresswoman saying “the world is gonna end in 12 years,” the climate change claims that get the most attention and airtime are just plain false.
For one thing, it’s clearly not a hoax. Take a look at the climate data for your city on NOAA.com and look up the average temperature in your city from 1971-2000, 1981-2010, and 1991-2020. If your city hasn’t gotten a degree or two warmer over that period, let me know, because it’ll be the first I’ve seen.
The world is also not going to end because of climate change, not in 12 years and not in 120. It will get several degrees warmer on average, maybe more in the worst-case scenario, and the world will survive. The problem is what it will do to the people living in it.
I would encourage those who are skeptical of climate change for one of these reasons to consider what I’m about to say apart from any political talking points. I’m no left-wing activist, and I’m not even that interested in the politics of it all. I’m speaking as someone who’s been very interested in the weather from a young age and has a great respect for the science of meteorology and climatology. As many know (especially our youth group students), until my late teens, I wanted to be a meteorologist. So this is not a political post. It’s a post about the weather and people.
Love your neighbor: The proper basis for approaching climate change
When talking about anything to do with the environment, we Christians often point to God’s first command when he created humanity: “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it; rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and every creature that crawls upon the earth” (Genesis 1:28). We honor God by respecting the resources he gave us and stewarding them responsibly.
That’s absolutely true. But based on what’s coming to light about climate change and its effects, but as we look at the issue of climate change, it’s clear that action on climate change is tied to an even more foundational command: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” This is the central command of the law of Moses, and according to Jesus, it’s the second greatest in all of Scripture. And as we read it, let’s recall that our neighbors are those around the world, from the family next door to the poor family in Nicaragua, especially those who are affected by our actions.
What is wrong with warmer weather?
In non-apocalyptic language, then, what actually is happening? Most of it comes back to the level of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, gases that help Earth retain heat from the sun. The most abundant of those is carbon dioxide (CO2). Over the last 100 years or so, the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere the level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has increased from about 280 parts per million to about 410 parts per million (ppm). This is an astronomical increase, unprecedented in not only human history, but at any point in the last 800,000 years, which have been marked by numerous ice ages and thaws.
We’re already feeling its effects. In the last 100 years, global temperatures have already risen 1 degrees Celsius (1.8 F) because of it. If that number sounds small to you, keep in mind that the difference between global temperature in the 20th century and during the last Ice Age, when glaciers were carving out the Great Lakes, was about 6 degrees Celsius (11 F).
What does this mean for the future? Well, by doing some digging (literally) and looking at Earth’s buried past, we can actually take a look into the past and see what the world looked like last time there was this much CO2 in the atmosphere. The last time CO2 was 400 ppm was about 3 million years ago, during what’s called the Pliocene epoch.
As I say this, I know my young-earth creationist friends may not buy this illustration, but whether you accept the 3-million-year timescale or say it was a pre-Flood time when the environment was different, we can still paint a reliable picture of the world at a time when CO2 levels were that high. In other words, even if you’re skeptical of the age of these finds, the content of the finds is quite clear.
It’s a jarring picture. Peter Brannen, writing for The Atlantic, describes a world with sea levels 80 feet higher than today. The ice sheets in the Arctic and Antarctic were much smaller. Although the planet was on average only 2-3 degrees C (3-5 degrees F) warmer than today, in the Arctic the difference was 10-15 degrees C (18-27 degrees F). That would make interior Alaska about as warm as Minnesota. The shores of the Arctic Ocean teemed with life, and many areas that are now deserts were much wetter, containing lakes and vegetation. The East Coast was tens of miles further inland due to higher sea levels. Hurricanes and other storms were stronger and more damaging.
But that is clearly not the case today. If high CO2 levels are going to alter the world that much, why haven’t they done so already? It has to do with the ice sheets. Ice sheets at the poles have a major effect on the climate. As long as they’re intact, they tend to reinforce a cold environment, because it turns out it’s very hard to melt a 2-mile-thick hunk of snow and ice. They also lock up a lot of water that would otherwise be in the ocean. And as paleoclimatologist Maureen Raymo explains in a documentary for PBS:
The ice sheets are out of equilibrium with the atmosphere right now. The atmosphere’s warming, we’re adding more CO2 every year. You could think of them like a frozen lasagna you’ve put in a preheated oven, you know? And the oven is our atmosphere, warmer, and the ice sheets are melting just like the lasagna would slowly melt, and it takes a while.
In other words, it’ll take a while to get there, but that’s now our trajectory, and that’s in the most optimistic scenario—that is, if the CO2 levels stopped rising very soon. If emissions continue and the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere grows even more, we could be heading toward conditions that resemble even hotter times.
Why this is a humanitarian issue
This is not just a problem for trees, polar bears, and dolphins. The ecosystem has adapted to changes far greater than the ones taking place. But humans have not, and that’s our concern when it comes to climate change.
Most who are in the middle class and upper class won’t notice that much. They get their food from the grocery store, live in sturdy buildings with heat and air conditioning, have access to high-quality medical care, and don’t live in areas prone to flooding. Those that find the changes to their environment inhospitable are more likely to be able to muster the resources to move elsewhere. Most people in the developed world will adjust just fine, except perhaps for those who live along the coasts.
It’s the poor who will be disproportionately affected. Those who live in poorly-built communities will be more devastated by stronger storms and less able to rebuild. Those who must work long hours outdoors will be more prone to heat illness with more frequent and stronger heat waves. Those who can’t afford air conditioning will also be subject to illness or death from the increased heat. (Excessive heat is already the top weather-related cause of death in America.)
In some cases, warmer weather will drive disease-carrying animals to habitats they didn’t previously occupy. And those whose livelihoods depend on somewhat reliable weather patterns, such as farmers, will struggle to adapt. With more people competing for fewer resources in areas ravaged by climate change, it may even lead to more conflicts and wars (it’s already believed that climate change played a role in the war in Syria, for example).
To put it simply, climate change is not an environmental or political issue, but a humanitarian one.
Reducing your carbon footprint is not enough
In the last 50 years, there’s been much public messaging about our individual duty to protect the environment by recycling, carpooling, and using fewer greenhouse gases. While that’s a good thing and it does make a difference (particularly on a local level), it has to be clearly recognized that it‘s not going to make a meaningful dent in climate change. That’s just the hard reality of it. We just saw that CO2 levels are already the highest they’ve been in 3 million years and are steadily climbing higher at a rate far faster than nature has ever seen.
You and all your friends could never use a greenhouse gas-emitting appliance again and it wouldn’t make a meaningful difference to global temperature. Never mind how unrealistic and unproductive it is to expect enough people to alter their lifestyles to fit in less with a world that operates on greenhouse gases. Individual actions are good, but it’s too big a planet and a process that’s too far along for the actions of even a few million concerned citizens to make the necessary impact.
Finding real solutions with realistic expectations
So what should we do? First, I think the importance of taking climate change seriously can’t be understated. We human beings are just not very good at seeing the future as a real thing, and that’s especially true for a future so far off many of us won’t see it. But we need to accurately understand what we are facing, because when we do, we’ll recognize that we can’t rely on the actions of a relative handful of charitable and selfless individuals, but we need action at the macro level. There needs to be some balance between entrusting it to the government with some fabled Green New Deal and entrusting individuals and corporations to prioritize future people’s livelihoods over present convenience. Neither is sufficient or advisable on its own, yet there needs to be cooperation and coordination at the highest levels as well as responsibility for individuals.
But we also have to be realistic about what we can achieve. We aren’t going to stop climate change, and we aren’t going to slow it down much either, not at first. It seems that the biggest impact of our actions now probably won’t be felt in 2050, when our actions might make a fraction of a degree’s difference, but in 2150, when they may prevent something the models can’t yet predict but is a very possible trajectory—perhaps warming of 10-15 degrees F or more. That might not be the most motivational messaging (“Save the world in 150 years!”), but it’s the truth, and we need some truth in a world full of (purported and real) hoaxes and lies.
Some consequences of climate change are inevitable. It won’t destroy the human race, but it will be disruptive to the lives of those being born today. It will endanger those who are poor and without means to make adjustments. There is going to be a significant amount of change no matter what we do. Therefore, any discussion about climate change needs to include measures to help people adapt to a world that will be considerably warmer no matter what we do.
I’m not sure what these solutions are, so I’m sorry to disappoint anyone who was hoping I’d end with that. There probably aren’t any good solutions that everyone will like. At some point, we have to say that it’s simply necessary to take action if we care about our neighbors who are being born today.
Climate change is ultimately a spiritual battle for Christians. Christians have a choice of what role they will play in this potentially planet-altering time. Will we put our God-given minds and skills to use to glorify God in taking his creation seriously and loving our neighbor? Will Christians who are inclined toward the fields of engineering and technology see if God is calling them to set their sights on dealing with climate change? Will Christian teachers and prominent voices take it seriously and encourage those who are hurting due to the effects of climate change and due to the effects of regulations intending to mitigate it? Will we play a part in helping adapt our way of life to something that’s sustainable for the neighbors who come after us?
God gave us the responsibility to rule over the Earth and to love our neighbor. Dealing with climate change appropriately is directly connected to both of those commands. We cannot carry them out properly without addressing it.
