On Monday, the Christian nationalist organization Christians Engaged broadcast a panel from the organization's 2022 conference in which several elected officials discussed how their Christian faith shapes their work in office.
Among the participants was Wayne Christian, who serves as Texas Railroad Commissioner. Despite its name, the Railroad Commission of Texas does not actually oversee the state's railroad, but rather wields jurisdiction over the state's oil and natural gas industry and infrastructure.
During the panel, Christian declared that concern about protecting the environment is Baal worship.
"How does your Biblical understanding of Christian principles translate into this conversation and apply to this conversation about energy and resources and how we are stewards of God's earth?" asked the moderator, Texas state Rep. Matt Schaefer.
"Well, the most important thing is it's God's gift to man," Christian replied. "God told us real quick that man was the one that was supposed to take care of this and it was our responsibility to do it."
"The biggest scam in history—I've found in the six years I've been as your Railroad Commissioner—is this Green New Deal," he continued. "All this is the biggest scam on the public worldwide."
Christian went on to mock concerns over rising global temperatures, declaring that even though temperatures have increased, "we've decreased environmental deaths by 98 percent" thanks to oil and gas which he said "has kept us warm and cool during hot and cold times."
"We're going to fix it by doing away with the protections God gave us the last 100 years?" Christian sneered. "Does this sound like a logical process? .... We think—as they have been teaching us for 40 years, from Al Gore's time—that Mother Earth if it weren't disturbed by man would be in perfect balance, and anything man does messes that up. So, anything we do is bad. If we make water cleaner, stronger, better available, that's wrong because that's disturbing Mother Nature. Now that's the same thing that I read in the Bible as worshiping Baal. We worship Mother Earth."
"Why would God have created the Garden of Eden if Mother Earth was so friendly outside?" Christian then concluded, triumphantly.
It is worth noting that when hundreds of Texas died in 2021 as a result of the state's power grid collapsing during a severe winter storm, Christian was quick to blame renewable energy and fight efforts to strengthen the power grid.
