Gavin Ortlund, Megan Basham, and Evangelical Climategate

Introduction
So my friend Megan Basham’s book Shepherds for Sale: How Evangelical Leaders Traded the Truth for a Leftist Agenda has just dropped and the interwebs have gone up in a sheet of flame. When I started writing this, the book was sitting at number 17 on the Amazon sales list. And hopefully this article convinces another handful of folks to go out and buy their own copy. 

This isn’t a full review. This is just a brief excursion into the initial fray caused by the book, and as it happens, tied to Basham’s work in Chapter 1. Chapter 1 is on Climate Change, and the ways evangelical leaders have been suckered into that particular Leftist Agenda piece. One of the characters that figures in the chapter is Pastor Gavin Ortlund who dropped a video earlier this week arguing that Basham had misrepresented him in Chapter 1 of her book when she critiqued a video he published a couple of years ago about “climate change.”

The Sitch
So Basham summarizes Ortlund’s video, beginning with his concern that many Christians, tending to be politically conservative, have simply dismissed climate change based on socio-political associations – specifically political liberalism — without studying the issues carefully. And Ortlund says he thinks that’s why most Christians aren’t active in leading the charge on something like climate change. But Ortlund cautions strongly against that since human-caused climate change, he argues, is the consensus of most scientists. While Ortlund says he just wants to have a conversation and later in the video insists he doesn’t mean to be depressing or cause panic, he also says that climate change is a really big deal. And he outlines the potential consequences as being very severe: extreme local weather events, not enough water, all your crops dying, drought, famine, flooding, wildfires, people dying, political problems, and war. So it’s a REALLY big deal, and could be catastrophic.

It’s in this context that Basham summarizes his basic stance: “He goes on to say that every ‘scientific body of national or international standing agrees that human-caused global warming is a serious problem.’ To not accept that consensus, he says, is to buy into ‘conspiracy and hoax;’ it is a failure to ‘take a responsible posture’ as a Christian” (P. 27). This is the central bit that Ortlund takes issue with and claims misrepresents his view. He says that what Basham says about him is “not true.” 

But first, Ortlund takes issue with Basham’s summary at the end of Chapter 1 that it isn’t wrong for pastors to weigh in on these complex issues, but it is wrong to make climate change a test for biblical faithfulness. Ortlund says he almost fell out of his chair when he read this. He says that he in no way has done this, and in particular, made a point of not advocating for any particular political policy. But at the very least, Ortlund is forgetting that in his climate change video he did say that “If you are pro-life you should care about climate change” and argued clearly that he believes caring about climate change should go hand in hand with a Christian view of the dominion mandate and care of creation. Rather than actually presenting any other perspectives, Ortlund asserted scientific consensus, warned against rejecting that consensus, and then urged Christians to think of it like being “prolife.” Maybe Ortlund didn’t think about what he was saying when he made that claim, but it would be easy for someone to come away from that video believing that the “scientific consensus” around climate change is just as clear as whether or not it is morally acceptable to murder a baby in its mother’s womb. 

Ortlund points out that at the end of his video he says that if someone has a different opinion about this “that’s fine,” but “that’s fine” in what sense? At best, Ortlund is simply unclear. “That’s fine” like it’s fine to be an atheist and we can have a dialogue about the existence of God (but you’re catastrophically wrong)? He just said that being pro-life means caring about climate change, and therefore it’s hard not to conclude then that caring about climate change is a moral matter and therefore some kind of test of biblical faithfulness, even if Ortlund is willing to have a dialogue about the topic. “That’s fine” and “let’s have a conversation” isn’t clear enough. It’s actually a pretty radical failure of theological and ethical “triage,” one of the key concerns Ortlund says he has about Megan’s work.

But Ortlund doubles down, triples down that all he’s interested in is having that conversation, that dialogue, and making sure Christians actually study the issues. But again, that’s extremely confusing since his only description of an opposing view is with words like “fundamentalist,” “shooting from the hip,” “dismissed for socio-political reasons,” and “political liberalism.” For wanting a “dialogue” and a “conversation” he straw-manned and insulted anyone who might have been willing to sit down with him. I can’t remember a single respectful description of Christians who think that the whole climate change movement is a massive hoax. 

He insists that the whole point of his video was to have a dialogue without attacking each other. But that is exactly what Ortlund did in his video. He did not even allude to the substantial body of evidence, respected theologians or scientists, or millions of reasonable people who do not take “scientific consensus” seriously anymore because the same institutions have been telling us that we evolved from apes, that boys can turn into girls, forecasted millions of deaths from COVID, shut down our churches and businesses, and demanded that we all take an experimental vaccine. I have no doubt that Ortlund intended to have a respectful dialogue, and I assume he and I could sit down with a beer and have a great conversation. But he actually insulted and attacked millions of thoughtful, intelligent Christians, and the fact that he doesn’t know that he did so means he is doing exactly what Basham was pointing out. He is treating conservative Christians the way elite liberals often do, as intellectual rubes, ripe for liberal indoctrination (and I know Ortlund is not a liberal). 

Ortlund tries to claim that Megan has gotten things exactly backwards: that he just wants to have a conversation, and that it is Megan who has made climate change a test of biblical faithfulness. But Megan is the one who actually acknowledges both sides and doesn’t take a side, except where she’s exposing all the funding for the liberal agenda. Ortlund did not present both sides, insulted one side very clearly, likened his position to being pro-life, and then claimed he only wants to have a conversation. 

Who’s Being Irresponsible?
Ortlund’s central objection seems to be Megan’s summary statement: “To not accept that consensus, he says, is to buy into ‘conspiracy and hoax;’ it is a failure to ‘take a responsible posture’ as a Christian” (P. 27). Ortlund insists he did not say this, since in context, the latter quote is from a moment in his video where he says “shooting from the hip” and not “hitting the books” is irresponsible. He says he was only talking about the method of arriving at a conclusion and not the conclusion itself. Fine, but nowhere in the video does Ortlund give even a hint that the conclusion would be responsible either; and all the intimations are that anyone who actually “hit the books” and studied the issues for themselves will come to similar concerns as he has. It is a very reasonable conclusion to make that someone who doesn’t see climate change as on the same level as abortion hasn’t hit the books, is probably shooting from the hip, is probably a reactionary, conservative fundamentalist, and is probably being irresponsible. 

Likewise, he minces words, trying to distinguish all the scientific bodies actually being in cahoots together being a “conspiracy and hoax” from those who have concluded that they actually are in cahoots together. But I’m honestly not sure what the difference is. If they are all colluding, there would be a conspiracy and hoax, and Ortlund admits that would be true enough, but he insists that he didn’t mean that about people who think there is one. But generally speaking, either there is a conspiracy or there is not, and if there is not a conspiracy, but a body of people believe there is, they are the ones now perpetrating a conspiracy. Maybe Ortlund did not intend to imply that, but it seems like a very clear Venn diagram with a bunch of overlap. Megan’s summary interpretation is therefore completely reasonable. 

Ortlund says that Megan’s summary of him is bearing false testimony, but that is simply not true. He has made these claims without any substantial defense of alternative views, leaving viewers to reasonably conclude that being concerned about the extreme possible repercussions of climate change is a really big deal, as big a deal as abortion, and certainly given the impression that conservative Christians who do not view this like him have probably not hit the books, are probably being irresponsible, and they probably think the scientific community is in cahoots on these issues, which is probably a fundamentalist hoax.

Conclusion
Yes, Ortlund does say he doesn’t intend to shame people or create despair in people, but this is simply incoherent given the alarming descriptions he gives of what might happen if we don’t do anything about climate change. Ortlund laments that Megan didn’t present her view of climate change and his view and actually begin a true dialogue, but ironically, that’s exactly what Ortlund failed to do. He says it would have been more productive if Megan had presented both sides and see exactly where they agree or disagree. He says that would have been more productive. Heh. Something about pots and kettles and calling them black.

He also wonders why Megan didn’t call him before the book went to press to discuss where they differ or to clarify his views. Again, the same thing could be said back to Ortlund: why didn’t you interview climate change skeptics? I mean you could have at least quoted from some of the scientists and scholars that have raised serious concerns about climate change claims. I mean, when you “hit the books” and really studied the issues, you read a bunch of the opposing views, correct? You didn’t just watch a bunch of liberal propaganda and assume the conservative critics were irresponsible, conspiracy theorists, did you? So why didn’t you present both views, Mr. Ortlund? 

Yes, the truth matters, but Ortlund’s protests are silly. Megan’s claims are fair and reasonable. This is why I tweeted: “At best, Gavin, doesn’t understand the war we are in. If he did, he would completely understand why @megbasham used him as the example she did. But his bambi-in-the-headlights refusal to understand, while warning against the danger of ‘fundamentalism,’ suggests it’s far worse.”

Ortlund spends the last half of his response video claiming that Megan’s work is a failure of “theological triage,” a failure to delineate clearly the levels of disagreement or agreement, and he cites a bunch of evangelical heroes (Lewis, Machen, Spurgeon, Shaefer) as examples of people who he thinks do a better job at triage and says they would disagree with Megan’s approach. But quite apart from what those men would have thought about the actual scientific questions, I believe those men would not have nearly the same difficulty in seeing what Megan is pointing out. Machen got kicked out of the presbyterian church for throwing down about a missions committee. The fact that Ortlund shakes his head with confusion and says, “Chapter 1 on climate change in a book about shepherds for sale is just really odd,” suggests that he would have the same confusion over Machen’s insistence on an independent missions board.   

Of course the truth matters, and of course we must tell the truth, as Megan did. But for some reason Ortlund cannot see the massive threat of climate change propaganda Megan lays out in the rest of the chapter. Even if he thought she had drawn some wrong conclusions about his particular views, a faithful pastor would appreciate why and how she could have done so. The fact that he doesn’t understand how what he said in that video is just fodder for leftist activists demonstrates that he is for sale. I take him at his word that he has not yet been bought. But he is certainly flirting with it. He cites one chart in his original climate change video alluding to “50 million years” ago and a quick scroll through his other videos suggests he denies a world wide flood and it seems doubtful that he believes in six day creation. I certainly don’t believe Ortlund intends to be for sale, but no one ever does. The sign often goes up on our backs at first, and the enemy feeds us crumbs of respect, bitterness, intellectualism, resentment, disappointment, and fame. And only little by little do good men sell out. But meanwhile, shepherds are not guarding the flock. If Ortlund cares about guarding the flock, which I assume that he honestly does, he would do a new video granting the reasonableness of Megan’s concerns, and explain all the dangers of climate change alarmism and how the “scientific consensus” has often led Christians down dark paths of political and spiritual oppression and destruction. 

At the very least, if Ortlund really is interested in a conversation about climate change, he should invite Cal Beisner onto his channel and actually have that conversation he says he wants to have. But until then, his video is an attack on faithful pastors and scholars like Cal Beisner, his colleagues at the Cornwall Alliance, and millions of faithful Christians who have been talking about these issues intelligently for decades. But a refusal to do that calls into question Ortlund’s sincerity, and only underlines the need for Megan’s book.