Do you think the threat of global warming is over-exaggerated, or even a con? Does this make you a fearless radical, a free-thinking independent?
Not according to the Bishop of Stafford. He believes it makes you the moral equivalent of Josef Fritzl.
In an article for his local parish magazine - a change from the usual notices about fetes and appeals for a new church roof, you'd imagine - the Rt Rev Gordon Mursell, the Bishop of Stafford, has strong words for those who would blithely turn up the central heating dial another notch:
Josef Fritzl represents merely the most extreme form of a very common philosophy of life: I will do what makes me happy, and if that causes others to suffer, hard luck.
In fact you could argue that, by our refusal to face the truth about climate change, we are as guilty as he is - we are in effect locking our children and grandchildren into a world with no future and throwing away the key.
Fritzl, let us remind ourselves, imprisoned his daughter in a cellar for 24 years, repeatedly raping his daughter and fathering her seven children. As moral equivalents go, he'd be nobody's first choice.
It's interesting that the first UK paper to pick up this story was the Telegraph, fast becoming the climate deniers' title of choice (see here and here).
Mursell's message certainly seems likely to reinforce the suspicions of anyone who already believes that climate change science is fast becoming something close to a religion that cannot be challenged.
To me, this just seems a bizarre and unnecessary comparison. However valid you might consider the bishop's wider point, the moment he brought Fritzl into things, the central message was always going to be lost.
