[Reader-list] An article from New York Times (March 3)

[Taraprakash]

Evangelical's Focus on Climate Draws Fire of Christian Right By LAURIE 
GOODSTEIN Leaders of several conservative Christian groups have sent a 
letter urging
the National Association of Evangelicals to force its policy director in 
Washington to stop speaking out on global warming.

The conservative leaders say they are not convinced that global warming is 
human-induced or that human intervention can prevent it. And they accuse the
director, the Rev. Richard Cizik, the association's vice president for 
government affairs, of diverting the evangelical movement from what they 
deem more
important issues, like abortion and homosexuality.

The letter underlines a struggle between established conservative Christian 
leaders, whose priority has long been sexual morality, and challengers who 
are
pushing to expand the evangelical movement's agenda to include issues like 
climate change and human rights.

'We have observed,' the letter says, 'that Cizik and others are using the 
global warming controversy to shift the emphasis away from the great moral 
issues
of our time.'

Those issues, the signers say, are a need to campaign against abortion and 
same-sex marriage and to promote 'the teaching of sexual abstinence and 
morality
to our children.'

The letter, dated Thursday, is signed by leaders like James C. Dobson, 
chairman of Focus on the Family; Gary L. Bauer, once a Republican 
presidential candidate
and now president of Coalitions for America; Tony Perkins, president of the 
Family Research Council; and Paul Weyrich, a longtime political strategist
who is chairman of American Values.

They acknowledge in the letter that none of their groups belong to the 
National Association of Evangelicals, a broad coalition that represents 30 
million
Christians in hundreds of denominations, organizations and academic 
institutions. But, they say, if Mr. Cizik 'cannot be trusted to articulate 
the views
of American evangelicals,' then he should be encouraged to resign.

Mr. Cizik (pronounced SIZE-ik) did not respond to requests for an interview 
yesterday, and the association's chairman, L. Roy Taylor, was unavailable. 
But
the Rev. Leith Anderson, president of the association, said, 'We're talking 
about somebody here who's been in Washington for 25 years, has an amazing 
track
record and is highly respected.'

'I'm behind him,' said Mr. Anderson, who was named president in November 
after the sudden resignation of the Rev. Ted Haggard, the Colorado pastor 
caught
up in a scandal involving a gay prostitute.

Mr. Cizik, who is well known on Capitol Hill, has long served as one of the 
evangelical movement's agenda-setters. He helped put foreign policy on the 
evangelical
agenda in the late 1990s, focusing on the persecution of Christians in other 
countries.

He said in an interview last year that he experienced a profound 
'conversion' on the global warming issue in 2002 after listening to 
scientists at a retreat.
Now an emblem for a new breed of evangelical environmentalists, he has been 
written about in Vanity Fair and Newsweek and has appeared in 'The Great 
Warming,'
a documentary on climate change.

Evangelicals have recently become a significant voice in the chorus on 
global warming. Last year more than 100 prominent pastors, theologians and 
college
presidents signed an 'Evangelical Climate Initiative' calling for action on 
the issue. Among the signers were several board members of the National 
Association
of Evangelicals; Mr. Anderson, who has since been named its president; and 
W. Todd Bassett, who was then national commander of the Salvation Army and 
was
appointed executive director of the association in January.

Mr. Haggard, then the president, and Mr. Cizik did not sign, after criticism 
from some of the same leaders who have now sent the letter about Mr. Cizik.

In interviews, some signers of this latest letter said they were wary of the 
global warming issue because they associated it with leftists, limits on 
free
enterprise and population control, which they oppose.

'We're saying what is being done here,' Mr. Perkins said, 'is a concerted 
effort to shift the focus of evangelical Christians to these issues that 
draw
warm and fuzzies from liberal crusaders.'