IN polite response to Messrs Alexander and Cadle (BFP May 9), it is clear that the global warming controversy is closely connected to the evolution/creation debate.

Mr Alexander suggests that the fossil record provides irrefutable evidence for evolution, but the earth’s rock strata are devoid of transitional fossils. For example, W. J. Bock, Professor of Evolutionary Biology at Columbia University, writes, “We lack completely fossils of all intermediate stages between reptilian scales and the most primitive feathers” (American Zoologist 40 - 2000, p485).

Mr Cadle states that Darwin’s study of finches on the Galapagos Islands establishes the truth of evolution, but all that Darwin observed was variation within a species (finches changing the size and shape of their beaks). He saw no transition from one ‘kind’ of creature into a completely different kind, which is what evolution is all about (e.g. reptiles evolving into birds).

During a colder stage in the earth’s climate history, namely the ‘Little Ice Age’ of 1550-1850, there were nevertheless many catastrophic storms. Studies in the logbooks for 1701-1750 of Caribbean-based British Naval ships reveal three times more hurricanes per year in that colder period than in the years 1950 to 1998.

Mr Cadle suggests that the adverse effects of extreme weather events show God not to be loving, but many thousands of people die every single day. Is God unloving, because we shall all die sooner or later?

We live in a fallen world which is no longer a paradise. The reason that death first came into the world was because man chose sin rather than God (Romans 5:12).

The anxieties of well-meaning people about climate change would be alleviated by faith in the Trinitarian God, who constantly maintains His creation.

The fact that the climate, and indeed our very lives, are in God’s hands should humble all to seek with urgency the salvation from sin which Christ alone can bring.

Rev. Peter Simpson, Penn Free Methodist Church