Board index ‹ The Problem of Evil and Suffering

[Marauder]

This is a rant.

I’ve known my father-in-law for thirty years. He has always been annoyingly proper, kind, nice, law-abiding and thoughtful. He’s the type of person who can be boringly counted on to always do the right thing. He inherited and expanded a successful business. My in-laws faithfully attended the local, small town church, actively participating on every level.

Then Parkinson’s disease struck. He had to sell his business. This kindhearted, loving couple could no longer stay in the home they built in his hometown. He spent many years planning this house for their golden years, designing it with a single floor and wide doors for when wheelchairs might be needed. They had to move to assisted living so they could stay together. She is devoted to him and knew the road would be hard.

This is the cruelest disease. It first stole his ability to move and speak; now it has taken his understanding. After he wandered from the facility a couple of times the caretakers moved him to another part of the complex, The Memory Center where he can be cared for around the clock. As I said, she is devoted to him and now she is consumed with the guilt of having let him down. He doesn’t understand and resents being left in the center. Here are two innocent people who in the decades I’ve know them have been nothing but truly good, responsible and reasonable.

As an atheist my heart goes out to them for the sheer tragedy they’ve suffered. But when I try and see it from the perspective of Christianity I get frustrated at the unfairness of it all. What could possibly be the point? Mysterious ways and plans outside my understanding just don’t cut it. If I’m not meant to understand these things the point of this suffering seems even more ridiculous. If my in-laws faith is unchanged and they therefore are rewarded in the next life I still can’t see the purpose, especially since my father-in-law seems to have lost the capability of understanding altogether.

In all sincerity, how do you Christians not see the absurdity?

[jimwalton]

There's no mistaking that tragedies like this are just awful to endure. I'm very sorry for your pain.

There's no reason to think that the existence of God, the acceptance of suffering by Christians, and the existence of suffering in the world are contradictory concepts. Logically speaking, there's nothing in the "syllogism" that is irrational. What's really hard about it (besides the suffering itself) is trying to make sense of it all.

For one, I think that's a clue. You feel a pull to make sense of it all. That tells you you believe in purpose in the universe and in our lives, both of which point to the existence of God rather than just random natural processes. But the scene contradicts your sense of justice: Why didn't God do something? Why do things like this exist without God's interference, especially for his own people? A couple of thoughts come to mind.

One is the retribution principle: if the world was a just place, then good people should get rewarded and bad people get punished. If God was just, that's the way the world would work. But that doesn't really make sense. If that were the case, people would start being good just to get the prize, and so they really wouldn't be being good, just selfish or greedy or whatever. But then would it be more fair if the good people had it worse than others? Of course not; there's nothing fair about that. So the retribution principle really is not the way the world works or the way God works. Good and bad things happen to us all, at apparently undetectable percentages. That doesn't mean there is no God or that he is unfair.

As far as suffering, it also can't be true that REAL good always works to eliminate evil as far as it can. For instance, we say that pain is evil (and suffering is an absurdity), but wait a minute: when a doctor performs surgery, he causes pain, but he doesn’t stop being good because he did that. As a matter of fact, the pain was part of the good he did, and you can't get rid of that "evil" without getting rid of the "good" too. So a "good" God and "pain" aren't automatically contradictory.

Well, you may continue, then, maybe it's only evil when it doesn't produce a good that outweighs the evil. Well, but you’ve already admitted then that the existence of pain is not a contradiction to a person being good and allowing that suffering.

OK, then. Maybe God is perfectly good only if he tries to eliminate every evil that he can without also eliminating a greater good? Bingo. God can be all-powerful and good, and certain evil can still possibly exist. That’s what I would say, for sure. Sometimes suffering brings out the best in people, and they display nobility and courage in the face of it. Sometimes people get stronger by it, or learn important lessons. It’s very possible that good and evil together can be a good state of affairs. And that means that God can be all-powerful, and permit as much evil as he pleases without forfeiting his claim to being good, as long as for every evil he permits there is the possibility of a greater good—as long as there is a balance of good over evil in the universe as a whole. That’s exactly what the Bible teaches.

People's suffering is tragic, no doubt, but it's not an absurdity. If you think so, you have to show that if there is ANY evil, it's unjustified evil, and that evil is always unjustified. But even if it’s remotely possible that evil is justifiable for a possible greater good, than there is no contradiction with God being good and evil existing. Is this getting too tangled, or is it clear? You’ll have to let me know.

All I’m saying is that it’s possible that God is perfectly good, and that God allows evil to exist in the world although he could prevent it. The point is there may be reasons he doesn’t prevent it, but that doesn’t make Him not good.

But what about those "evil" and "absurdity" of Parkinson's or protracted cancer? To prove that its' unfair (besides the deep pain you are feeling) what you have to prove is that even those suffering never do and could never possibly have ANY redeeming value if your point is true. I would say that’s difficult, if not impossible, to prove, and that what the Bible teaches is still possible, and certainly not a contradiction or an absurdity.

I'm so sorry for the ache you are feeling.

[Purge It]

> You feel a pull to make sense of it all. That tells you you believe in purpose in the universe and in our lives, both of which point to the existence of God rather than just random natural processes.

I don't get that he's doing that at all. His thoughts mirror my thoughts when I saw family members going through severe pain and their quality of life plummet due to cancer. My father was skin and bone when he finally succumbed. I simply can't reconcile this with a 'loving' god.

He also said, "As an atheist my heart goes out to them for the sheer tragedy they’ve suffered. But when I try and see it from the perspective of Christianity I get frustrated at the unfairness of it all. What could possibly be the point?" The making sense of it all is when he adopts a Christian perspective. I feel more comfortable accepting that we're born and we naturally deteriorate rather than god inflicting Parkinsons on a decent, church going, god fearing man.

[jimwalton]

I agree that maybe it's easier to deal with suffering and pain if you have the opinion that the world is a random and meaningless place anyway, and life has no significance other than our biological composition and survival.

You're mistaken to think, though, that God "inflicts" such things on people. Because God doesn't make it his business to stop every case of pain doesn't mean at all that he inflicts it. If you think God should intervene to stop suffering, we need to play that out to the edges. If you want God to stop all suffering, he has to take complete control over our bodies so that we never fall from a ladder and break an arm, or stub a toe, or slip on the ice. He has to take control of our cells and their systems so that we incur no diseases or ever feel pain, I guess, even when we touch a hot stove. But we also experience emotional suffering, so he has to start controlling our minds so that we don't offend or feel offense. Oh, control our lips and ears too. Except now we're not human anymore. We're just robots. "I like your idea" is meaningless because the person was meant to say it, but God has to control our thoughts so we don't take offense. "I love you", "I'm sorry," or "I forgive you" are just out of the question. If God is going to eliminate all suffering, he has to eliminate all of what otherwise makes us human.

Maybe you think, then, well, not ALL suffering, but we're back to what I said before then. That means God can be good and still allow evil to exist. But maybe you think, "Well, he should at least stop the suffering of good people." Now we're back to the retribution principle where good people get the goods and bad people get punished, but that's not a productive way to run the world.

Maybe you should tell me: What is it that you want God to do so that it "makes sense" and yet preserves our humanity?

[Durzanult]

I'll back you up on this thought, by taking it a step further (into mormon doctrine).

What if these pains and trials are necessary for us to have the possibility to reach our full potential (to be like God)?

Would denying us of the trials that we were prepared to go through, trials that are tailored to the individual, be good in that light?

Sometimes trials are meant to occur, or just happen to happen without God's interference. Sometimes trials are brought on by the foolish actions of yourself or others. Will he deny you the opportunity to face these challenges?

He will deny you the challenges that you do not have the potential to overcome. He will give you challenges that he knows you can face, and that if you do overcome them, will make you stronger because of it. He will aid you in all challenges you face, by giving you the strength to continue. He will carry you though those low points.

[jimwalton]

I guess my opinion is that I don't particularly agree with what you said, and something about doesn't pass the smell test: It doesn't smell right to me. What you said makes it seem as if God inflicts or foists suffering on us to make us stronger or to achieve a good. Most of the time I can't go with that (I will acknowledge that the Bible talks about God testing people to refine their faith, but I won't get anywhere NEAR saying that's what most suffering is about).

You said "the trials that we were prepared to go through," again making it seem like God predestined us to suffer in certain ways, which I don't see in the Bible at all either.

Suffering is seen in the Bible as the result of sin, the result of sinful choices and behavior, and the consequences of a fallen world. God works to redeem suffering, but I can't go with the thought that God causes most of the suffering that happens. It makes him a monster, which is not the picture the Bible shows us.

It's true that he can use our suffering to bring out other beneficial qualities, but that doesn't mean he caused the suffering or that "God made it happen for a purpose." To me that's a horrid thought.

I agree with you that God can make us strong through them, that he can aid us in the challenges we face, and that he carries us through. Bishop Desmond Tutu, in South Africa, sat through the hearings of the crimes that whites committed on blacks in the name of God and the government. Yet after two years of listening to such horrific accounts, Bishop Tutu came away with his faith strengthened. The hearings convinced him that perpetrators are morally accountable, that good and evil are real and that they matter. Despite relentless accounts of inhumanity, Tutu emerged from the hearings with this conviction: "For us who are Christians, the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ is proof positive that love is stronger than hate, that life is stronger than death, that light is stronger than darkness, that laughter and joy, and compassion and gentleness and truth, all these are so much stronger than their ghastly counterparts."

Pertaining to the Newtown massacre of 2 Christmases ago, Philip Yancey reports, "The tragedy in Newtown, CT, in December of 2012, tells a different story. There was an outpouring of grief, compassion, and generosity, not blind, pitiless indifference. There were acts of selflessness, not selfishness: in the school staff who sacrificed their lives to save children, in the sympathetic response of a community and a nation. There was a deep belief that the people who died mattered, and that something of inestimable worth was snuffed out on December 14."