Katherine Hayhoe loves to talk about Jesus, which is not unusual for someone who was raised in an evangelical family and is married to a pastor. She also loves to talk about climate change, which is natural for an atmospheric scientist who directs the Climate Science Center at Texas Tech University.
When she speaks she often combines the two topics, as she did last week at Upper House, on the University of Wisconsin campus. Which meant that a very religiously diverse audience heard a compelling Christian testimony, along with some compelling information on climate change. Her talk was co-sponsored by a number of campus-based and climate-oriented organizations.
“What is science other than trying to figure out how God put it together in the first place,” she said. “The reason why I am a climate scientist is because I am a Christian. Climate change is not just a scientific issue, it is a humanitarian issue.”
Hayhoe stresses that her information on climate change is not based on faith, but on researched scientific data. And the data is clear. “Climate change is loading the weather dice against us,” she said, noting the multiple record temperature and precipitation levels being recorded on a regular basis. “Yet most people don’t think it will effect them personally.”
She said the trends indicate Wisconsin’s weather will be more like Arkansas in the not too distant future. Miami is in the process of raising its streets two feet, to cope with rising ocean levels. And Native Americans in Louisiana are climate refugees, being driven from their homes by rising ocean levels.
“Our first response to this type of apocalyptic vision is often fear. We shut down. But the Bible says we should respond with love and hope,” she said, referencing II Timothy 1:7: “For God did not give us a Spirit of fear but of power and love and self-control.” [NET]
Hayhoe acknowledges that the problem many people have with climate change is not the facts but the proposed solutions. She quoted Galen Call of the National Association of Evangelicals, who observed, “People oppose climate change for political reasons. They believe the government is going to take away their freedom.”
She also acknowledges that many of her fellow evangelical Christians do not share her perspective on climate change. “There are two types of evangelicals,” she said. “There are those who take the Bible seriously. And there are those whose statement of faith is written by politics. Some people call themselves evangelicals who don’t know what the Bible says. Love is a defining characteristic of Christians.”
In her Ted Talk on what we can do about climate change, Hayhoe notes that the best predictor of how we regard climate change is where we fall on the political spectrum. In the video, and in her talk, she says the most important thing we can do to address climate change is to talk about it.
She has other suggestions, of course, including her Global Weirding series on PBS, her Ideas That Matter Series on CBS, and many other online resources, including our story on this website about a previous visit to Madison. Her message is prophetic. And like most prophecies, it’s difficult to hear and, for some, hard to believe.