Not that I don't think this is a fair counterpoint to make, but in my own experience trying to find the best arguments for religion, I learned a lot more and got better reasoning talking to random laypeople than by asking priests and theologians.

Of course, the fact that I talked to a lot more laypeople than priests and theologians is most likely the determining factor here, but my experiences discussing the nature and details of climate change have not followed a similar pattern at all.