Archbishop of Sydney

His Eminence,
Cardinal George Pell
Cardinal Priest of the Title of S. Maria Domenica Mazzarello

See also:

See also: About the Archdiocese


Home > Our Archbishop > Addresses, Statements & Media Releases > Article	Printable Version

Statement on Climate Change

By + Cardinal George Pell
Archbishop of Sydney
24/10/2007

I am a believer in the Catholic understanding of faith and morals. I am certainly sceptical about extravagent claims of impending man-made climatic catastrophes.

Scientific debate is not decided by any changing consensus, even if it is endorsed by public opinion. Climate change has been occurring, probably since earth first had a climate.

Science is a process of experimentation, debate, and respect for evidence. Often it is dealing with uncertainties rather than certainties, and so its forecasts and predictions can be spectacularly wrong. We must not ignore evidence that doesn't suit our cause.

In the 1970s some scientists were predicting a new ice age because of global cooling. Today other scientists are predicting an apocalypse because of global warming. It is no disrespect to science or scientists to take these latest claims with a grain of salt. Commitment to the scientific method actually requires it.

Uncertainties on climate change abound. Temperatures in Greenland were higher in the 1940s than they are today, and the Kangerlussuaq glacier there is not shrinking but growing in size.

The journal "American Scientist" has recently published a study on the melting glacier on Mt Kilimanjaro. The study confirms that air temperature around the glacier continues to be below freezing, so it is not melting because of global warming. Instead, the melt pattern of the glacier is consistent with the effect of direct radiant heat from the sun. Human activity can't be blamed for that.

The day before Al Gore was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize with the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the English High court ruled that DVDs of his documentary "An Inconvenient Truth" cannot be shown in schools without teachers providing additional materials to correct 9 "significant errors" in the film.

Among them were claims that Pacific atolls are being evacuated because of rising sea levels and that polar bears are drowning because they have to swim up to 60 miles to find ice. The court found there is "no evidence" to support either claim. Four polar bears have drowned in recent times, but because of storms not melting ice.

There are many measures which are good for the environment which we should pursue. We need to be able talk freely about this and about the uncertainties around climate change. Invoking the authority of some scientific experts to shut down debate is not good for science, the environment, for people here and in the developing world or for the people of tomorrow.

My task as a Christian leader is to engage with reality, to contribute to debate on important issues, to open people's minds, and to point out when the emperor is wearing few or no clothes. Radical environmentalists are more than up to the task of moralising their own agenda and imposing it on people through fear. They don't need church leaders to help them with this, although it is a very effective way of further muting Christian witness. Church leaders in particular should be allergic to nonsense.