Calvin Beisner

Cal Beisner of the Cornwall Alliance is the Religious Right's favorite anti-climate change "expert" despite the fact that his academic credentials are limited to a doctorate in Scottish History.  While appearing on AFA's "Today's Issues" radio program today, Beisner provided the most concise explanation of why Christians cannot believe in climate change when he declared that the entire theory rests on the assumption that the earth is an extremely fragile place, which conflicts with the Biblical view that the earth was built by God for man's use.

Therefore, to believe in climate change "really is an insult to God" ... and it will eventually lead to tyranny:

A recent film released by Truth in Action Ministries, entitled Why Christians left the Political Arena, implores evangelicals to remain politically engaged. Featuring activists Calvin Beisner, Wayne Grudem and Rick Scarborough along with an eminent montage of gay rights, pro-choice, and environmental activists, the film decries any separation between religion and public policy. It implies that if a truly observant Christian is to obey the commands of Jesus, they must advocate for laws that “protect” marriage, and warns that God will hold us accountable for “how we have acted in responsibility towards influencing government.”

Truth in Action Ministries has previously embraced anti-gay activists who have likened homosexuality to “slavery” and warned that “moral chaos” was inevitable due to “liberal secular people” marginalizing religious people in the public arena.

Watch:

Beisner: Law plays a proper function in curtailing sin. So, we have a responsibility to seek to use laws to retrain the outward sinful conduct of people, even where we can’t use them, we never can use them, to change people’s hearts.

Grudem: If I truly love my neighbor I want laws that will protect my neighbor’s marriage, that will give good education to neighbor, that will protect my neighbor’s health and well-being, and economic well-being, so government doesn’t steal everything from us. I think it is a way of obeying Jesus’ command ‘you shall love your neighbor as yourself.’

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Scarborough: If pastors don’t get involved in confronting the moral issues of our day, biblically, we will soon digress into becoming a lawless nation. And frankly, we’re on the very edge of that right as we speak. Our country is becoming an amoral country because so many preachers have withdrawn from the culture completely.

Beisner: There is no part of life that is neutral, to which Christ doesn’t say “it’s mine”. No part of life. And there is no neutrality on any moral issue whatsoever. And all of life is religious.

Grudem: The bible does tell us that God will hold us accountable for how we act. I think that includes all of life and certainly it includes how we have acted in responsibility towards influencing government.

The Cornwall Alliance's Cal Beisner returned to Janet Parshall's radio program yesterday to continue their anti-environmentalism collaborations and promote his latest effort called In His Image 2012 which seeks to "completely reshape the way Americans, and then people around the world, think of human beings and our role on Earth – to reassert the sanctity of human life and sexuality, the beauty and centrality of marriage, the goodness of human multiplication, and the dignity of human work and godly dominion over the Earth."

As Beisner explained, this new effort is necessary to help Christians understand that Judeo-Christian civilization is facing a "spiritual world war" being waged by proponents of Darwinsim, gay rights, and environmentalism, all of which are "rooted in the rejection of the fundamental Biblical doctrines of God and humanity":

This is the launch of what we intend to be a multi-year educational program to help people to understand what are the common roots behind a lot of the challenges that the Christian faith and frankly the whole Judeo-Christian civilization faces.

Whether it's naturalistic Darwinism with the eugenics and population control and government family-planning programs that come out of it with coerced sterilization and abortion and euthanasia. Or free-sex, no-fault divorce, gender confusion, homosexual so-called marriage, polygamy and polyamory. Or radical environmentalism, animal rights, ecosystem rights and Gaia worship. Or the war on abundant, affordable, reliable energy. Or ever-tightening environmental regulations at federal and state levels. Or eco-imperialist rules that are forced on poor nations, and more.

What we recognize is that all of these are rooted in the rejection of the fundamental biblical doctrines of God and humanity. All these different threats are not isolated; they're different parts of a spiritual world war. It's not primarily a political war, it's certainly not primarily a military war, it's a spiritual world war and we as Christians have got to recognize that spiritual enemy and then bring spiritual weapons into battle against that.

On Bryan Fischer's radio program yesterday, Fischer and Cal Beisner discussed how environmentalism was becoming the established religion in America. 

How exactly is environmentalism a religion, you ask? Well, as Beisner explained, it has its own doctrines, its own holy day (Earth Day,) its own food taboos, sacrifice rituals (recycling,) paradoxical beliefs, sacred structures (recycling bins,) and it proselytizes.  And, as Fischer added, just like with the early church, heretics (i.e. global warming deniers like Fischer and Beisner) are punished and excommunicated:

Republican presidential frontrunner Rick Santorum raised a lot of eyebrows this weekend when he attacked environmentalism as anti-Biblical and said that President Obama has a “phony theology” that sides with “radical environmentalists” over the Bible. While it was remarkable to hear these theories coming from a major presidential candidate, the theories themselves are nothing new. Instead, Santorum was drawing from a dual line of attack on environmentalists and progressive people of faith that has recently come into wide use among the Religious Right.

In 2010, People For the American Way looked at the concerted right-wing effort to frame environmentalism as anti-Biblical in a Right Wing Watch: In Focus report, The ‘Green Dragon’ Slayers: How the Religious Right and the Corporate Right are Joining Forces to Fight Environmental Protection . The report took its title from a right-wing “documentary” called “Resisting the Green Dragon,” which featured major Religious Right figures including the Family Research Council’s Tony Perkins, the American Family Association’s Bryan Fischer and faux historian David Barton. Kyle put together a highlight reel:

The Religious Right’s relatively new antipathy to environmentalism is largely the result of the hard work of E. Calvin Beisner, a purveyor of dominion theology and the leader of The Cornwall Alliance, a group with financial ties to the oil industry. The Cornwall Alliance’s sole purpose is to convince the Religious Right to buy into the Corporate Right’s climate change denialism and help them demonize environmentalists. The RWW report details the growing partnership:

In the last decade, as evangelical Christian leaders increasingly became involved in conservation , “creation care” and taking action against global climate change , the alarms went up in corporate America that many traditional members of the conservative coalition were becoming advocates for environmental protection. To counter the rise of the faith-based environmentalist Evangelical Climate Initiative, the Interfaith Stewardship Alliance emerged. The ISA, propped up by business interests including Exxon Mobil , has peddled misleading and false claims to make the case that climate change is a myth. In 2007, the ISA was renamed the Cornwall Alliance for the Stewardship of Creation and became more belligerent and zealous in its anti-environmental activities.

The Cornwall Alliance is led by E. Calvin Beisner, who believes that since God granted humans “dominion” over the earth, humans have a right to exploit all natural resources. As Randall Balmer writes in Thy Kingdom Come, Beisner “asserts that God has placed all of nature at the disposal of humanity.” Balmer quotes Beisner’s own summary of his dominion theology: “All of our acquisitive activities should be undertaken with the purpose of extending godly rule, or dominion.” As Balmer notes, “the combination of dominion theology from the Religious Right and the wise use ideology of corporate and business interests has created a powerful coalition to oppose environmental protection.”

According to a report by Think Progress , the Cornwall Alliance is a front group for the shadowy James Partnership. Both the James Partnership and the Cornwall Alliance are closely linked to the Committee for a Constructive Tomorrow (CFACT), an anti-environmental group that is “funded by at least $542,000 from ExxonMobil, $60,500 from Chevron, and $1,280,000 from Scaife family foundations, which are rooted in wealth from Gulf Oil and steel interests.” CFACT is also part of a climate change denialist network funded by the ExxonMobil-financed Competitive Enterprise Institute.

Beisner is a CFACT board member and an “adjunct fellow” of the Acton Institute , which is primarily funded by groups like ExxonMobil, the Scaife foundations and the Koch brothers. Beisner is also an adviser to the Atlas Economic Research Foundation, which is financed by the oil-backed Earthart Foundation , the Koch brothers, and ExxonMobil.

In fact, Beisner is not a scientist and has no scientific credentials. Despite claiming to be an authority on energy and environmental issues, he received his Ph.D. in Scottish History.

Beisner has been extraordinarily successful in convincing the Religious Right that environmentalism presents a threat to Christianity. Earlier this month, he told Fischer that the EPA is violating the separation of church and state by helping to promote the upcoming film version of “The Lorax.” Why? Because he claims that environmentalism is itself a religion. This is rhetoric that Santorum, in saying that Obama’s theology is influenced by “radical environmentalists,” has swallowed whole.

Also active in the effort to recruit the Religious Right to the Corporate Right’s view of environmentalism has been David Barton, self-proclaimed historian and all-purpose fake expert. In 2010, he appeared on the Glenn Beck show along with Beisner explain that environmentalists want us to “live in fear”:

Barton -- who is no more a historian than Beisner is a scientist – is a widely influential figure in the Right, cited by prominent figures including Newt Gingrich, Michele Bachmann and Mike Huckabee, and who has even been invited to testify before the Senate about climate change.

Santorum’s remarks were so shocking because this is the first time they have been heard on the national political stage – but his talking points on environmentalism and progressive faith have already been polished and accepted as gospel by the movement the Religious Right.

Like David Barton, who has no academic training as a historian but is the Religious Right’s point person on American history, Calvin Beinser of the Cornwall Alliance has no scientific credentials but has become the go-to person for right-wing activists on questions of science, particularly climate change. While he lacks any credentials what Beisner does have is close ties to organizations financed by the energy industry and a history of attacking scientists, spreading misinformation, and fueling fears that the environmental movement is a pagan plot to destroy Christianity and kill “about 95% of the human race.”

Beisner is especially concerned about growing calls for environmental protection made by evangelical Christians, and has went out of his way to attack groups like the Evangelical Environmental Network for calling on public officials to clamp down on mercury poisoning. Beisner’s outburst against his fellow evangelicals should come as no surprise, as he has even gone after a Koch-financed study which actually confirmed the science behind climate change. He joined Focus on the Family’s political arm CitizenLink, whose head Tom Minnery appeared in Beisner’s Green Dragon video series, to disparage the EEN for thanking both Republican and Democratic politicians who supported efforts to reduce mercury emissions:

According to the EEN, one of every six American babies is born with harmful blood mercury levels, “which causes permanent brain damage in the unborn and infants.” Therefore, the 12 federal legislators EEN is thanking with radio, TV and billboard ads for supporting the EPA restrictions are “pro-life.”

In truth, only one in every 1,000 American babies is exposed to harmful doses of mercury, and the slight delays in cognitive development it may cause generally disappear by age 7, says Beisner. Moreover, all 12 of the federal legislators EEN is supporting are among the most pro-abortion Congress has to offer.

“Calling this ‘pro-life’ is quite a misnomer, but it will result in a lot of people being confused about who’s really pro-life and who’s not,” Beisner said. “Some of these people have 100 percent pro-abortion voting records in Congress, so people need to know they’re really getting the wool pulled over their eyes if they fall for this.”

But the Center for Disease control did in fact find that one in six newborns, or 630,000 of the 4 million babies born annually, are “at risk for developmental disorders because of mercury exposure in the mother's womb,” which PBS described as mercury levels “so high that they are potentially at risk for learning disabilities and motor skill impairment and short-term memory loss.”

This attack on evangelical environmentalists comes at a time when Focus on the Family head Jim Daly pledged to take the organization in a different direction than his predecessor James Dobson, and Christianity Today reported that CitizenLink recently launched “an effort to reach young adults on issues related to sex trafficking, poverty, and the environment.” It also puts the group at odds with the long list of evangelical leaders who signed the “Evangelical Call to Stop The Mercury Poisoning of the Unborn.”

But apparently for Focus on the Family, being “pro-life” does not entail protecting newborns from mercury poisoning.

Energy industry apologist Calvin Beisner of the Cornwall Alliance appeared on Janet Parshall’s radio show yesterday to once again do the bidding of polluters. As we’ve reported in The Green Dragon Slayers, Beisner has no scientific credentials but is closely tied to energy companies. During the interview, Beisner directed his animus as the Evangelical Environmental Network, which launched a pledge to combat mercury poisoning:

One in six babies, over 700,000 each year, are born with harmful levels of mercury in their blood, and coal-burning power plants are the largest source of domestic mercury pollution.

Jesus said, "Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these."

We believe this is an urgent and escalating moral crisis which calls for immediate action!

According to the National Institutes of Health, “For fetuses, infants and children, the primary health effects of mercury are on neurological development. Even low levels of mercury exposure such as result from mother’s consumption methylmercury in dietary sources can adversely affect the brain and nervous system.”

But Beisner said that it was more important to leave polluters unregulated. He insisted that regulations against pollution were actually going to kill people and that his pro-corporate view is the real “pro-life” position. He went on to say that advocates of environmental protection want to deliberately weaken the economy because “the environmental movement hates human prosperity”:

These were people who frankly didn’t know the science behind it, all they saw was that babies were endangered and they wanted to protect these babies. Well of course we would want to protect the babies but the science isn’t good and so consequently the EEN has succeeded, at least temporarily anyway, in fostering the notion that this is a pro-life cause. It's not a pro-life cause if anything the opposite is a pro-life cause because whereas the current levels of mercury admissions are not causing any deaths to anyone, the reduced economic output for this country will indeed increase premature deaths among the American population.

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The real aim is to try to get us to use less energy overall because energy fuels a prosperous economy and the environmental movement hates human prosperity because it sees it as a threat to the environment.

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• Calvin Beisner says that Christians who care about the environment and protest "are actually disobeying scripture by doing this."

Janet Porter believes that the recent tornadoes that left hundreds dead in the South were a consequence of America’s acceptance of legal abortion and “sexual sin,” along with the supposed mistreatment of Israel. In addition to wildfires in Oklahoma and Texas, Porter claims that Americans gave “God reason to at least partially lift His protective Hand from America.” Porter isn’t the only Religious Right leader who said that the tornadoes signaled that America trigged God’s wrath: Calvin Beisner of the Cornwall Alliance said the tornadoes were “early warning signals” and “little tastes” of God’s judgment. Porter warns that America continues to risk “God’s wrath against us” until Americans “give their undivided attention to God.”

Is God trying to get our attention?

The worst tornado outbreak in American history has left hundreds dead. Mississippi flooding has not been this bad in 80 years. Wildfires have swept through millions of acres in Texas and Oklahoma.

There are a number of things that could give God reason to at least partially lift His protective Hand from America, including the millions of abortions done here each year, the flaunting of sexual sin, and our recent treatment of Israel.

Any support that the U.S. provides for dividing the Holy Land risks God’s wrath against us. Rabbi Aryeh Spero says that a division could displace 400,000 Jews from their homes and more Christian holy sites would fall under Muslim control.

Pray that this will not happen and that many Americans will give their undivided attention to God.