Letters to the Editor | 9 December 2006

The green gospel

From Paul Horgan

Sir: I read the article by Allister Heath (‘It’s a wonderful world: richer, healthier and cleaner than ever’, 2 December) with interest. The author is correct to point out that the optimism of Indur Goklany’s book will be drowned out by the doom-mongering of the environmentalist lobby. I believe that the reason for this is simple. Environmentalism is the new religion of the Western world. It has replaced the scientific secularism of Marxism/socialism, which itself replaced monotheism when this began to be discredited by Darwinism.

This Earth worship has all the hallmarks of Christianity, which is why it is so easily accepted by the non-church-attending masses. Just as the Roman empire discovered, when the masses have embraced a religion the state has to follow, and it is doing so with a vengeance.

Consider this: the ejection from Eden and original sin are replaced in environmentalism by the transformation of the largely agricultural economy by the Industrial Revolution into a polluting hell on earth.