It’s oh so noble of them to begin their comfortable little protests while their savior is on vacation.

One more reason we need to make voices of reason heard.  If these folks had their way we would all still be riding horses (imagine the mess).  Their latest regulations in Tx will close a number of coal fired plants here and it is predicted we will have rolling blackouts throughout the state.  Imagine that when you have 100 plus days for 40 or 50 days.  How many people will die from heat related illnesses.  But we will be “clean” according to the radical environmentalists.  Go figure!

And remember this:  Among this bunch of groupies, you’ll find folks who complain about the price of gasoline at the pump, yet they insist that the North Slope be closed down, that there be no more exploitation of our oil deposits, etc.  And how many among them are lawyers who claim to be “environmentalists?”  They’re pseudo-environmentalists…....the same types who run the Sierra Club.

Most people don’t realize the incestuous relationship that the EPA has with radical enviro groups like the Sierra Club.  When the EPA proposes a new regulation, the more radical parts of the regulation usually don’t make through the public comment period.  The Sierra Club then sues the EPA in federal court to force the more radical changes, the federal court rules in favor of the Sierra Club or they settle out of court – almost always in favor of the Sierra Club changes.  Both sides get what they want:  EPA gets to enact the more radical regulations it could not get through the regular rule making process; while the Sierra Club, in addition to the radical changes, gets most or all of its legal fees reimbursed by the EPA!  Nice revolving door there – both sides get their radical regulations they would not be able to get otherwise, and Sierra Club keeps its legal war chest full and their lawyers happily employed.

I have said this a number of times before, and will say it again:  The Episcopal Church could immediately have a beneficial effect on carbon emissions if it shut down its many underutilized facilities and consolidated its shrinking, minimal congregations.  It requires an enormous output of carbon emissions, relative to the humans who benefit, to continue cooling and heating all of those empty churches.  Until TEC takes this logical and needed step, it is among the carbon hypocrites.

Isn’t it wonderful that TEC is in the forefront of this gospel initiative?  ENS stories always makes me feel so proud. After reading this I’ve decided to buy a Ford F450 dually and have a big prime steak for lunch.

They know NOT of what they speak!
They want to keep “life on the planet as we know it.”  That simply doesn’t ring true.  They want to use energy for their protests (how many of them rode their horses to DC?) but prevent others from access to ultimately cheap, efficient energy from the coal sands.

Hypocrites.

First of all, it’s called the OIL SANDS in Alberta, not the Tar Sands. Second, though I’m Canadian, I’m not so sure they need a pipeline going that far. Third, would that these Episcopal clergy had as much zeal for the saving work of our Lord and Saviour that is the only reason for them wearing a collar.

#9 Ian+,

I think these clergy believe that they are doing the saving work of Christ.

“Fighting to stop climate change and working to protect life on the planet as we know it is one of the best ways I know of to witness to the risen Christ,” the Rev. Margaret Bullitt-Jonas, Episcopal priest and a co-chair of Religious Witness for the Earth

I can think of better ways of witnessing, but I don’t know if they teach those ways in the seminaries anymore.

More fake Christians.

Ian+ said,
“Third, would that these Episcopal clergy had as much zeal for the saving work of our Lord and Saviour that is the only reason for them wearing a collar.”
And I say to Ian+,
“You are absolutely correct!”

Too many clergy in ECUSA have been ‘making idols’ of sectarian issues instead of following the Great Commandment and carrying out the Great Commission.

Their idolatry of secular political issues has reached the point where they can be justly accussed of the heresy of syncretism.

These protesters must believe that stopping the pipeline will magically stop the extraction of this oil. Instead, the pipeline will be built to the Canadian coast, and the oil shipped to China—emitting Co2 all the way across the ocean. Those same tankers can then refill in the middle east and ship that oil to the USA. All this does is make the oil we will use come from more remote and less reliable trading partners. Pointless.

I always wonder where protesters like this think the US is going to get its oil instead. From the delightful Saudis, with their exalted human rights record? From St. Hugo of Chavez, so committed to giving voice to the marginalized? Perhaps Iran, with its strong commitment to religious freedom? Of course, that oil will be shipped in solar-powered tankers which will never, ever run aground and cause a spill.

Seriously though. Canada is a modern democracy under the rule of law, and has some actual concern for environmental regulations. By demonizing Canada’s oil industry, greens are by default forcing the US to turn from this good neighbour and instead rely on some of the most egregious human rights abusers, who care not a whit about the environment. Sadly, so many greens would rather put on this simulacrum of righteousness than actually think about how the US can rely on more ethical sources of oil.

Stephen+

Unfortunately, the Left always argues out of both sides of its mouth, and everybody just lets them get away with it.  My experience as a lawyer was fighting Sierra Club and other eco-radicals in our area who were against development of geothermal energy for electricity generation (it was “raping Mother Earth”) and literally at the same time were protesting against barges having to bring in fuel for area power plants because there could be a spill and an accident.  Geothermal energy would have directly lessened the need to bring those barges in.  Both protests were featured in the newspaper the same day.  At the time, I remember reading the paper and saying, “what is wrong with this picture?”

#9 Ian—The reason I’m sure they call it “tar sands” rather than “oil sands” is that it sounds more disagreeable, e.g. visions of tar balls washing up on beaches.  In my case, they went on and on about it destroying “the last lowland rainforest in the U.S.,” which is something they totally made up.  The exploratory site wasn’t even a rainforest, but abandoned former pasture land which had become overgrown with scrub growth.  But all of this stuff is marketed to their donor base to raise money, so they make it all sound as sexy and disastrous as they can.

How to handle this situation should NOT be made into a religious-moral issue but a prudential decision issue on which people of good-will can disagree.  Thus religious groups shouldn’t be joining in the environmental issues hysteria making their point of view a conscience issue. I still haven’t seen any conclusive proof that global warming is man-made. Nature, on its own, could very well be responsible for turning us back to the conditions when dinosaurs roamed and the Antarctic was ocean instead of ice. (And that was before those hated humans destroyed Mother Nature.) It is also amazing how much fraud and deceit by those wanting to gin up the man’s responsibility angle of the issue.
    Many people in good conscience believe strongly that what we most need now is jobs and independence from potentially unfriendly overseas sources of energy not a self- imposed economic paralysis.

Global warming is a natural occurrence; it has been happening since the Earth was formed, and it will continue long after mankind has become extinct or emigrated to other planets.  It has been said that ice ages come and go approximately every 10,000 years or so, and that we are progressing toward another one.

A couple of points:

- You can be a Christian and care about climate change, accept that it is happening, and be driven by a biblical understanding of stewardship to want to do something about it. It doesn’t necessarily make you a fake Christian.

- It is a travesty that the secular left turned this into such a polarizing issue that the party of Abraham Lincoln (who set aside Yosemite), Theodore Roosevelt (who did more than any other to foster environmental preservation), Richard Nixon (who created the EPA, the Clean Water Act, etc…) has turned its back on even the most innocuous scientific evidence. If the planet truly suffers from our inaction, it will be as much the fault of the left for making it a wedge issue as it is the Know-Nothing right.

- There are several reasons to oppose the Alberta oil sands project. Personally I care less about the carbon than that millions of acres of God created wilderness are being turned into a barren, toxic wasteland.  I wouldn’t necessarily describe it as “evil” per se, but seeing footage of what is being done there hurts my heart.

- All of that being said, does anyone care one iota for what members of an irrelevant and dying church, so captivated by their own self-importance and so full of their own virtue, have to say on this or any other political matter?

Did they walk, ride bicycles, or drive to the protests?

Canadians have been using the term “tar sands” for decades - and still do (including my friend working in the industry in northern Alberta).  That’s all I ever heard it refered to as when I lived in Edmonton in the early 80s.  More recently, the industry and the Alberta government have been using “oil sands”; presumably to put a kinder, gentler face on things.  Everyone I know still says tar sands.

I think the industry is more concerned about the objections of the first nations peoples through whose land the pipeline will run than they are about an interfaith protest group.

Some interesting “oil sands” pictures.  I guess the oil industry now has the Dalai Lama and Archbishop Desmond Tutu to worry about too (they use “tar sands” too).