Megan Basham, a journalist for the Daily Wire, recently published her much-anticipated book, “Shepherds for Sale.” It is supposed to be a detailed, thorough exposé of influence by parties with left wing political interests on various evangelical Christian institutions and leaders.
The first chapter is dedicated to examining the influence of a left wing climate change agenda within evangelicalism, and one person she mentions as being affected by this is Gavin Ortlund, a fairly prominent evangelical pastor in California with a popular Youtube channel who is also affiliated with The Gospel Coalition, an extremely influential evangelical organization. She devotes an entire section of the chapter to critiquing a video he made back in 2022 wherein he argues that 1.) Man-made climate change is a real, significant problem and 2.) Christians should take it seriously.
Gavin Ortlund then made a video in response to Basham’s critique of him in the book, with the central complaint being that she blatantly misrepresents and mischaracterizes his original video on climate change. The result has been a wide-spread debate on the subject with many other notable evangelical voices including Tom Ascol, Tom Buck, Bethel McGrew, and Neil Shenvi weighing in on the subject with the former three arguing that Basham’s representation of Ortlund was fair.
In general, while I have not yet read past the first chapter which is the relevant portion to Ortlund specifically, Basham’s overall thrust is one that fits my own views. I absolutely do think that many prominent evangelical institutions and leaders have adopted and pushed (knowingly or unknowingly) leftist views on many subjects that I believe are incompatible with orthodox Christian theology. Among these are the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission, which is the policy advocacy arm of the Southern Baptist Convention and The Gospel Coalition, who Gavin Ortlund is affiliated with. I have been vocally critical of many evangelical leaders including Tim Keller, Russell Moore, Beth Moore, Matt Chandler, JD Greear, and many others precisely on these grounds. In fact, this was one of my main reasons for leaving the SBC altogether in 2020. I don’t think anybody can validly accuse me of being a shill for “Big Eva.” I say that because when I take up a defense of Gavin Ortlund, it should not be interpreted as a defense of Big Eva in general, nor should it be interpreted as a criticism of Basham’s book as a whole which, as I said, I have not yet read the entirety of but am likely to substantially agree with.
That being said, I am a fan of Gavin Ortlund. I think The Gospel Coalition very often promotes extremely cringe views when it comes to applying Christian theology to political, social, and cultural issues. But there is diversity of views and voices even within TGC and he is one of the better ones. And I do tend to disagree with Ortlund when he does weigh in on cultural debates. I like him much better on issues that are more central to his focus—theology and apologetics. However, I think he is correct in his complaint that Basham badly misrepresented and mischaracterized his original video on climate change and, given the highly controversial nature of the book in which it appears, I think he has a right to be upset about it.
The basic point is that there are significant instances where what Basham claims Gavin Ortlund said in his video and what Gavin Ortlund actually said in his video are not the same, and the differences are significant.
The first misrepresentation is this: “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.” Note that the “consensus” being referred to is the scientific consensus on climate change.
This is absolutely, unequivocally, demonstrably not what Ortlund said, nor is it a logical implication of what he did say. What he actually said was this: “Number one, it’s just good to observe first of all that there is pretty much a scientific consensus or very close to a scientific consensus on human-caused climate change as a very real problem and this is again the appeal and just the burden I have when people are dismissive toward this if you’re gonna go against a near consensus in the scientific community, don’t just shoot from the hip, you know, study it and make sure that’s the wise thing to do because I see a lot of people reacting instinctively rather than hitting the books and I don’t think that’s a responsible posture for Christians.”
Just on its face, that is a far cry from saying “to not accept the consensus is a failure to take a responsible posture as a Christian. What he called a failure to take a responsible posture as a Christian was to “shoot from the hip” or “react instinctively rather than hitting the books.” Clearly, Gavin is not saying that to disagree with the consensus at all is inherently irresponsible, nor does he imply that one cannot possibly have “done the homework” and still found the scientific consensus to be unconvincing. In fact, the exact opposite is true, because the very next thing he says is “whatever conviction we come to, we should come to it by thorough study, among other things.”
It is abundantly clear that what is being called “irresponsible” is not any particular conclusion in and of itself as Basham claims, but rather the manner in which the conclusion is derived. And this is in keeping with the fact that he spent the entire introduction of the video explaining that he thinks Christians should actually care about the issue rather than dismiss it or approach it with an attitude of skepticism. He very clearly leaves open the possibility that someone can approach the issue responsibly and still end up disagreeing with the consensus, which is in keeping with what he says at the end of the video after laying out his reasons for why he thinks the consensus is compelling: “so that’s my appeal thanks for watching this video I appreciate it if you have a different opinion, that’s fine. Let’s just argue about it respectfully rather than just attack each other and so let me know what you think in the comments, and we’ll work at it together.” Is Gavin contradicting what he said earlier that having a different opinion is to be irresponsible? Or is it that Basham mischaracterized his earlier comment? I think the latter is clearly the case.
The second occurrence of blatant misrepresentation occurs immediately after the first: “As for why Ortlund feels his brothers and sisters must accept the prevailing climate change narrative, he offers nothing more original than those three magic words: love your neighbor.”
This is, again, not what Ortlund said, nor was it implied by what he did say. In the entire video, Gavin never placed any obligation of any kind to actually accept the prevailing narrative on climate change. As already seen, he did place an obligation on Christians to not dismiss it out of hand. He also spent a large portion of the video presenting his reasons for why he finds the consensus compelling (which Basham does critique fairly, in my opinion), but he never says or implies that you must agree with him on that out of a love for neighbor. Those words must be put into his mouth, because they did not come out of it. In fact, his only reference to loving your neighbor occurs in the introduction of the video before he ever even begins talking about the scientific consensus on climate change.
Ortlund spends the introduction of his video first explaining why Christians should care about environmental issues in general, one of which is climate change. He’s making the case that instead of avoiding engaging with environmental issues, Christians should be at the forefront of them because of their potential impact on those around them, including future generations. It’s the caring about environmental issues in general, of which climate change is one example, that Ortlund connects to the principle of “love your neighbor.” He never connects loving your neighbor to accepting the scientific consensus on climate change. Basham makes that connection for him and then attributes it to him. In reality, Ortlund appealed to love of neighbor as one argument in support of his general introductory point that Christians should care about environmental issues in the first place, not to morally compel you to adopt his conclusions about climate change specifically. And it’s not even the only argument he puts forth to make that point.
Gavin Ortlund did not say you must accept the prevailing climate change narrative as a matter of loving your neighbor. What he said was that the basic principle of loving your neighbor is a reason why you should care about environmental issues like climate change, and then he proceeded to present his argument for why he thinks climate change is an important environmental issue. He never argued that you must agree with his conclusion that the scientific consensus on the climate change is in fact correct in order to be loving your neighbor.
The result of these two blatant misrepresentations of Ortlund’s position is to create the impression that he is some climate change dogmatist who thinks you can’t possibly come to any other conclusion than the one he came to if you just do the research and that it’s a moral failure for a Christian to do so. That is the exact opposite of how he is attempting to come across in his treatment of the issue. At best, this is incompetence and at worst it is dishonesty.
From Gavin Ortlund’s original video, it is clear that he believes Christians should care about environmental issues in general, he agrees with the scientific consensus that man-made climate change is a significant environmental issue, he believes that Christians should have an open mind towards that scientific consensus rather than dismissing out of hand (especially on account of perceived association with liberal politics), and he finds the popular arguments against the scientific consensus unconvincing. He does not believe, as Basham misrepresents him as saying, that if you disagree with the scientific consensus then you must be doing so because you haven’t researched the issue enough, nor does he believe such a disagreement is in itself a matter of irresponsibility or failure to love your neighbor.
One last point of dispute revolves around Basham’s closing remark at the end of the chapter: “These are complex topics. It is not wrong for pastors and Christian leaders to debate them. But it is wrong for them to make agreement on environmental policies a test of Biblical faithfulness. It is wrong to make climate change activism a measure of one’s commitment to the Gospel. And it is wrong to bind consciences with a blithe and unthinking, ‘love your neighbor.’”
I fully agree with this statement. The reason it’s part of the argument is because in his response, Ortlund understands this statement to be in reference to him. Basham and many other commentators have since contended that it does not refer to him and that Ortlund actually misrepresented her critique in his response by saying it does.
Now, whatever view one takes on the matter, it does not change the fact that I have already shown two clear instances of misrepresentation on Basham’s part. But even so, I’m not inclined to grant the point because it is absurd. There is absolutely no reasonable way to read this closing remark, which occurs only a few pages after she finishes her analysis of Ortlund’s video specifically, as not applying to him.
The argument she puts forth is that it’s the last paragraph of the chapter and so she’s summarizing the entire chapter in which she addresses many other Christian leaders saying many things on the subject of climate change. She even explicitly says in the book she doesn’t mean to single out Ortlund. But the final line of the paragraph, “it is wrong to bind consciences with a blithe and unthinking ‘love your neighbor’” is the exact thing she just accused Ortlund specifically of doing just a few pages prior. To argue that the comment doesn’t apply to Ortlund when it’s a reiteration of a criticism she just finished using him as a specific example of is absolutely nonsensical. The fact that it doesn’t apply only to him but also to many others, or perhaps applies to him in a different way or to a different degree than it does to someone else mentioned in the chapter, doesn’t change the fact that any reasonable reading of it would be seen as including him.
At best, all Basham can say here is that she doesn’t accuse Ortlund of making climate change activism a test of faithfulness or commitment to the gospel, but only of binding consciences with a blithe and unthinking “love your neighbor.” But it is perfectly reasonable to think the full remark would apply to Ortlund equally because loving your neighbor is a test of faithfulness to the gospel. How can Ortlund be binding consciences on climate change activism by connecting it to loving your neighbor but not making it a test of faithfulness to the gospel? The two are completely inseparable ideas. The fruits of genuine faith are love for God, love for one another, and love for neighbor. If Ortlund suggests that you must accept his opinion or else you’re not loving your neighbor, then he is making it a test of faith. But, as I believe I have conclusively proven, he doesn’t suggest that, so he isn’t.
Basham might be completely correct in her critique of the reasons Ortlund gave for why he thinks the scientific consensus on climate change is correct. Gavin Ortlund might be totally wrong about the reality of man-made climate change. I am not scientifically literate enough to make heads or tails of it either way. I am a climate change agnostic. Even if I did agree with him that man-made climate change is real and it’s a problem, I don’t know if I’d agree with him on what needs to be done about it or not because he didn’t even advocate for any specific policy solution in his video.
Gavin Ortlund may also not be entirely correct in everything he said in his response to Basham. For example, he seems to think she accuses him personally of being a “shepherd for sale” which she doesn’t actually say. Her book is about how leftist influence works its way down the evangelical food chain, so that doesn’t mean every individual person is himself bought and paid for by leftist donors. The possibility that Ortlund himself is downstream from those who are bought and paid for and is just one voice being influenced by the resulting propaganda or cultural pressure is left open. She does not specify where exactly he fits into the overall issue. But she does egregiously misrepresent his video on climate change in order to use him as an illustration of the point that evangelical leaders are pushing a left wing political agenda, and that is both wrong and damaging to his reputation as a public theologian and apologist. As someone who finds him to be a very helpful voice on a wide range of subjects, I have a problem with that.
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