It’s still our Father’s world.

“This is my Father’s world:
I rest me in the thought
Of rocks and trees, of skies and seas;
His hand the wonders wrought.”

Maltbie D. Babcock
Traditional Christian hymn

We are reminded this week that God made the Earth and all that is in it and that He has dominion over it, the overwrought hand wringing of the Global Warming cabal notwithstanding.

That reminder was delivered to us by the news that the mail server at the Climate Research Unit at Britain’s East Anglia University was hacked and that about 3,000 emails are now out in the open. Those emails strongly suggest that researchers there engaged in activities intended to hide the fact that their claims of man made global warming are not supported by the available data. There was apparently an ongoing attempt to hide this fact and to silence by whatever means necessary the voice of anyone or any organization that might offer a dissenting viewpoint to the received wisdom of climate change.

Trillions of dollars and the long-term health of all developed economies hang in the balance. The Waxman-Markey Climate Change bill, otherwise known as “cap and trade,” which passed the House by just seven votes last June, is nothing more than a tax on the primary input of all economic activity, namely energy. If it ever becomes law, it will, without question, so severely cripple the U.S. economy that our standing as the most successful economy in the world will come to an end. That bill was put forth in the name of stopping global warming, a concept that we now learn is not settled science and is instead the product of individuals who are apparently hiding the fact that their data doesn’t support their case.

What a surprise.

But the largely malign industry that has arisen around global warming (now renamed “climate change”) is only a symptom. Of much more concern is the underlying disease, which is conceit. Large numbers of us are so self-involved that there is widespread belief that humans have superseded the Creator, and now possess sole dominion over the planet.

As I said in this space in the summer of 2008, we humans did not invade the Earth. The same God who made the Earth put us here. One can only assume that He did so on purpose. And one can only further assume that He knew as much about how we were going to behave as He knew about how fish and birds and cows and cats and dogs were going to behave. And if you have any faith at all, you can only assume that since He put us here, He fortified the Earth sufficiently to withstand our presence.

Someone somewhere once said, and I have often repeated, that whom the gods would destroy, they make prosperous.

It is the prosperity that we Baby Boomers inherited from our parents that is at the root of global warming folly and, frankly, much else that now troubles us. We are afforded our conceits by the fact that most of the problems that plagued mankind for centuries were pretty much put to rest by the industry and sacrifice of those that went before us.

Our parents defeated two tyrants in World War II, rebuilt the economy following the Great Depression, exported peace to Europe and Asia, stared down a malevolent Soviet Union and sustained prosperity over a period of decades on a scale that was once unimaginable.

Don’t believe me? Consider this. Hunger was still a widespread concern on the day my father was born. Today, the number one health problem in America is obesity.

Our concern with global warming has been a foolish luxury. A luxury afforded by the success of our miraculous free-market capitalism. If we fool around long enough, the miracle will end and we’ll wonder how we lost what was once so great.

Our parents faced serious problems and they put forth serious effort to overcome them. We have lived very well as a result.

We are now being called upon in this very difficult time to do the same thing.

One good start would be to tell the knaves and fools whose “science” cannot withstand objective review to get out of the way and let free markets and capitalism once again do their magic.

Beyond a wholesome stewardship, the Earth we can confidently leave to God.

It’s still His.