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Tuesday, 21 April 2009 11:01

Amid the environmentally friendly celebrations of Earth Day, you're likely to read and hear plenty about the latest news on global warming. Yet among pastors in this country, the jury is still out on whether what's been dubbed a global crisis even exists.

A recent study from LifeWay Research of more than 1,000 Protestant pastors found that 47 percent agreed strongly or somewhat that global warming was real and man-made. The exact same percentage of pastors disagreed strongly or somewhat, while another 6 percent were unsure. Interestingly enough, the division becomes more apparent when pastors are categorized by denomination, location and political ideology.

Among mainline denominations, three-quarters of all pastors believe in global warming and chalk it up to human actions. Within evangelical circles, however, that number drops to a mere 32 percent. In larger cities, the majority (55 percent) of pastors agree that global warming is real, whereas 43 percent of rural pastors adhere to this belief. And not surprisingly, pastors who consider themselves liberal in their political theology were almost three times as likely as conservative pastors to think global warming is both a real and man-made problem.

"Protestant pastors are split on the issue of man-made global warming and their views impact their communication," said LifeWay Research director Ed Stetzer. "Mainline clergy answer the question with similar numbers to self-identified Democrats and liberals in surveys of the general public. Evangelical clergy answer the question in similar percents to Republicans and conservatives. At the end of the day, Protestant pastors are as divided as Americans are on the issue of global warming." [Baptist Press, 4/16/09]