My silence has been a function of watching various scientists jumping off the U.S.S. Climate Change, and believing (in my innocence) that her once proud prow was shortly going to be pointing at the moon. Ah, but there's life in the old girl yet, and so it seems that I shall have to rummage around in my bag of skeptical observations to see if I have any left.

Here's one. If global warming is indeed occurring, we need to get us some here in Idaho. Here it is late June now, and it would be nice if my grandkids didn't need to take their parkas to the pool so much. But it does cut down on sunscreen costs.

I am pleased to say that I made it all the way through this article without wheezing once.

Chesterton said that the hotheads of the French Revolution appealed to the goddess Reason, which was odd, because it would appear that this was the goddess who had smiled upon them least. Cornlius Van Til pointed out the pendulum swing nature of unbelief (which is constant), but which swings back and forth between rationalism and irrationalism, like the clock on the wall. The apostle Paul said that divine judgment consists of God giving men up to the futility of intellectual kleenex fires (Rom 1:21,28). Vain imaginations about sums it up.

I had a friend once who, when he was a boy, was taken by his father for a tour of skid row. His father, who was not yet then a believer, wanted his son to see consequences that come from certain choices. I thought of that, more than once, during the course of my study of  philosophy. I thought that the unbelieving Academy ought to be treated more like an intellectual skid row, and less like a haven for "Brights," to use the howl-worthy Dawkins moniker. Fathers ought to take their sons for a walk through all the smart people departments, and ought to finish with a stern warning, when they are out in the car about to head home, that if the son doesn't play outside more, and if he decides not to try out for the football team, this could happen to him.

Evolution is not just wrong, but is also risible. Malcolm Muggeridge put it well when he said that in retrospect, it will be shown to have been one of the great jokes of history. But, someone sputters, "Science! Science! Knowledge! Education!" and I would simply reply that such incantations don't work anymore. And the climate change harum scarum is worse, because it is simultaneously silly and a naked power grab. Because they were starting to lose us on all that "the planet's gonna boil!" stuff -- because chilly facts were coming down upon us like one of Al Gore's unfortunate snowstorms, and we already had six inch accummulation -- it became necessary to introduce the alien motif. We ought to recycle because aliens might see how fast our atmosphere is heating up and undertake a preemptive invasion. Really? And also Santa Claus might see you not recycling. Don't forget the naughty and nice argument. That's an important one.

You know, a scientist ought to hypothesize in the calm of his laboratory, with books and experiments and stuff, and not like Jake Blues on his knees in front of his jilted girlfriend.

Anyone who knows anything about it knows that real scientists are willing to engage, and are willing to debate the big issues. Those who just shout you down as a heretic are only showing how far away from the spirit of free inquiry they actually are. Torquemada was not one of twelve disciples, or one of the early church fathers. He was the poster child of the whole enterprise gone completely to seed. In the same way, just as the Christian Church desperately needed her Reformation, so also does the whole realm of Science. A scientific reformation would cull from the scientific ranks all the powermongers, politicians, shamans, the high-speed computer modeling fact-maker-uppers, and space alien movie screenplay writers. How about it then? Where is our scientist Luther?

Then something funny happened. The weather shifted in some very odd ways, we started hearing about climate change instead of global warming, and the Al Gore effect became apparent in weather patterns. Everywhere that poor man went, a snow storm followed. Those who lived by the weather anecdote died by the weather anecdote.

They probably could have managed this, because enormous amounts of money were involved, not to mention a power grab of Orwellian proportions. Men like this were not going to slowed down by snow flurries in Georgia.

But then the climate data went blooey. Turns out the books were cooked, rigged, made up, massaged, bought and paid for, and then lost. There went the climate, and the phrase "the science is settled" took on a much more ominous meaning.

And then God, for His mercies endure forever, sent the world the winter of winters. The one enthroned in Heaven laughs; He holds them in derision.

So then, please permit me to announce that global warming is over, and climate change is also over. The weather continues on, but that's okay. It always does that. What does this mean? It means the science is settled! Let the healing begin!

Can we keep our old light bulbs? The weird glow from those new ones would bring my gray head down to the grave in sorrow.

I just want everybody to stare straight at this for about 120 seconds without blinking. The Greens have successfully won their battle to categorize as a pollutant that element which makes plants grow lush and green. Heh. This would be really funny if it weren't so hilarious.

Before proceeding further, let me say that the edifying results here do not in any way justify the actions of whoever the hacker was. I do not know what the relevant laws are, but if the hacker is caught and identified, the same thing should happen to him that happened to the fellow who hacked into Sarah Palin's email account. Justice is justice, and justice shouldn't be politicized any more than scientific data should be.

At the same time, if the guy who hacked Palin's emails had actually found the dirt he was eagerly looking for, that dirt would still be public knowledge even after he headed off for jail. Everybody can't stop knowing what they now know.

And what we now know is that global warming is not just an egregious scientific mistake (which it always was). It is a mistake that certain dedicated true believers are prepared to persist in, by means of scientific fraud as necessary. If you scroll down to the bottom of the post I linked to, you will see an email in which a particular technique of number fudging is commended in order to "hide the decline."

Global warming religionists have already been on the defensive because of a decade or so of unusually wintery conditions every old place, but this puts them back on their heels in a serious way. In the next phase, look for defections of former believers to begin, and as soon as it is possible to be a global warming skeptic and/or denier, without being the leprous equivalent of a Holocaust denier or flat-earther, the thing will be completely over. Stick a fork in it; it's done.

First, why is it that I regard a Christian's baptismal vows, which renounce the devil and all his works, to include a rejection of being green, going green, or thinking green? Is it because I don't like the color? Is it because my motto is "Earth first! We'll pave the other planets later"? Not a bit of it. Scripture begins with a garden, and it ends with (green) garden city. Not only am I okay with this, but I regard it as every Christian's duty to live in a manner consistent with that overarching vision. So why do I gag on "green"?

It is for the same reason that you would not catch me in a Parisian mob, yelling "liberty, equality, and fraternity," even though all three of those things are good things. I am not pro-choice, even though choice is good. I believe that Christ came to liberate the proletariat, even though I would never speak of it that way. Virtually every instance of greenthink you will encounter today is watermelon green -- green on the outside, red on the inside. The thing is a statist sham from top to bottom, a naked, violent and abusive power grab. The issue for me is coercion and violence, and has nothing whatever to do with their promise to change the weather, for Pete's sake.

Here is their game. "What can we talk people into caring about, so that we may then manufacture a crisis in that area, using that bogus crisis to seize power through the mechanism of the state, with that power being all-encompassing?" If any Christians are hardy enough to object, they just throw the word stewardship at them. What I am throwing back at them revolves around an understanding that the devil is the father of lies, and when he lies he does so fluently, speaking in his native language (Jn. 8:44). Jesus, by way of contrast, told us not to judge on the basis of superficial appearances, but to make a right judgment (Jn. 7:24). It is not enough to say that "the nice man," who seemed very concerned, told me CO2 is a pollutant, and that nice weather is pollution. I mean, crikey. The fact that people are just galumphing along with this is a marvelous thing.

So what do I urge Christians to do positively? The question is a fair one -- it is not possible to fight something with nothing, and it really is necessary for us to set forth a positively vision, one that is distinctively Christian. So when do I do that? Whenever I am writing about the progress of the gospel toward that garden city, these are the terms I use. I speak of these things using the vocabulary of the cultural mandate, exercising dominion, postmillennialism, the kingdom, the lordship of Christ over all things, being fruitful and multiplying, and liberty. These things are my green.

What can we do to get from here to there? How shall we then live? We should love God and love our neighbor. We should do what God says to do in the Bible, which incidentally does not include any attempts to supplant God. We should get a job and work with our hands, for example (Eph. 4:28). We should not attempt to play God, realizing that He said that He would bring these things about gradually, as the yeast works through the loaf. As we learn how to worship Him more faithfully, and give ourselves diligently to the task in front of us (that which is near and clear), that is what He will use to bring about what He has promised. But our current attempts at "stewardship," to use an example of my wife's, is like a newborn demanding the family checkbook in order to make sure the phone bill gets paid.

Those secularists who want to play doctor and "heal the environment" are violating one of the basic tenets of the Hippocratic Oath -- "first, do no harm." In the mass of their movement, there is a great deal of gullibility, and at the top there is a great deal of evil. Christians have better things to do than tagging along behind them, trying to figure out a way to attach John 3:16 to one of the floats in their parade. For many Christians, cultural engagement is nothing more than taking whatever the world dishes up, and then trying to find a verse or two to decorate it with. It is like science fair projects in many Christian schools. Do the astronomy project, set up the display board, and then at the last minute try to find a verse with stars in it.

While on this subject, the problem with Chesterton's vision of "three acres and a cow" is not that he desired such a society. Who wouldn't want to live in the Shire? The problem is that, if we resist the temptation of keeping things "perfect" through coercion, in about three weeks there will be one industrious fellow with six acres and two cows, and another fellow, less industrious, a former farmer, who will be down at the tavern, drinking too much.

But my insistence that we not intervene in utopian ways now ought not to be taken as an indication that I think that everything is just fine the way it is. No -- our world is broken, and the creation groans. As we do justice, love mercy, and walk with humility, God will use that to bring about His good purposes. This world will be restored, fully restored, and our labors in the present will be used by Him to contribute to that restoration (1 Cor. 15:58). This entire world will one day sparkle an emerald green.

But that restoration will not be advanced by blunderers, who call CO2 a pollutant, or tyrants, who pollute the land with the blood of innocents. Neither will it be advanced by those Christians who tag along behind such, thinking that they can become leaders by following.

They do not see Tetzel in carbon offsets. They do not see shuning in the treatment the neighborhood gives the guy who doesn't sort his garbage according to the dictates of the regulatory bishops. They don't see a fierce imposition of morality in their crusades for the sake of saving us all from climate change. They do not see blasphemy laws in thought crimes legislation. They do not see their religion in everthing they do, and this is because idolaters are blind.

There is less excuse for Christians -- who are not blind in this way -- for going along with any of it. If you have ever wondered how an ancient Israelite, who had been fed by manna from the sky, could possibly have been attracted to one of the Canaanite groves and high places, just look at the pressure you feel to flush the toilet less, to take shorter showers, to get a smaller car, and to go through any number of other gyrations to reduce your carbon footprint. This is what syncretism always feels like. The gravitational pull is always this strong. And this is not being said in order to make you empathize with that ancient Israelite who was going native. This is being said to stir you up enough to make a name for yourself the way Phineas did.