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Answers For Skeptics is going to be another ongoing series here at The Broken Telegraph. Each part will at least partially address different criticisms that are commonly directed towards God and/or Christianity.
First up is a question that I’ve heard quite a bit during discussions with various skeptics: “How can there be so much evil in the world if God is all-loving,” or “why does God allow evil?”
I’m honestly surprised how often this comes up. I don’t mean to imply that it’s a simple question begging for an easy answer, but there is a reasonable answer within reach.
Our lives are obviously made up of choices and the results, so I have a hard time understanding why God gets blamed for the actions of six billion people (and all those who arrived on the scene before we did). It is a great display of God’s patience and love that he extends freewill to everyone- even when we all abuse it. After all, it’s not freewill if it only goes to the “good.” And if we proceed with this line of reasoning, aren’t we immediately ranking evil in terms of its perceived and cumulative effect? Should God restrain it based on the subjective interpretation of evil as it varies from person to person? That’s going to be tricky.
This question reminds me of the dangerous mindset that believes government should protect the population from all potential dangers, regardless of the intrusion and loss of freedom that follows. In the first place- no government can provide a complete shield, and why have so many forgotten that the risk of living in freedom is worth the reward? To enjoy the freedom that God has granted, and then to turn back and criticize the source for such a gift is a great contradiction. If we asked the government to stamp out evil at any cost, it would only lead to oppression.
This complaint often stems from cowardice. If we aren’t careful, we’ll end up asking God to fix poverty while we relax on the couch. Much of the evil that exists is thriving because people refuse to confront it and force a change. I am not discouraging prayer, just the kind that comes from an effortless vacuum.
Those who spend all of their time staring at the dirt are likely to conclude that life is just endlessly brown and occasionally muddy. More importantly, they’ll never see the sky, and will grow to hate those who do. The media can have a similar effect on those who drink it in. Without getting into the fact that the mainstream media is clearly broken, it is also too focused on death and sensationalism. The so-called news plays with anxiety, fear and dread in order to drive ratings, and spends a great deal of time reporting on near-apocalyptic projections, potentialities and maybe sos. According to Mike Judge’s hilarious movie Idiocracy- ”sh*t sucks” will be the headline across newspapers of the future. As crazy as that comparison might seem, I think we are living in a similar time of belligerent negativity. What is that doing to our hope?
We have a duty to stay informed and I am a huge supporter of legitimate journalism, and believe in using good information to bother the complacent in hopes of driving real change. I want our government to be held accountable and We The People have an obligation to do so. But something intended for good can still wreck a healthy outlook if it becomes an obsession.
The swell of evil should draw us to desire the personal change that God offers instead of just scrutinizing his rules or the messed up playing field. I’m not saying that evil is easy to cope with, or that our response to tragedy should be cavalier. Life is full of doubt, and includes times of weariness, mourning, loss and grief. But there is a time for all of it, and if we focus only on what has damaged us, or study global horrors to the extent that we become ineffective and internally bitter, then the fight for good has lost another participant.
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If you have a question that you’d like me to take a crack at in a later part of this series, feel free to leave it in the comment box below.
Ian, for The Broken Telegraph
Brian, for The Broken Telegraph
15 Comments
Monday, June 23, 2008 at
I find this article to be very interesting. I think that this question is often posed by unlearned skeptics that have no real argument.
Christianity is an institution that has been in mass operation for nearly 2,000 years now. Such a basic and obvious question should likewise have a basic and obvious answer, given how much time Christians have had to formulate one.
Not that I am discounting your response, I agree that the concept of freewill is an important cornerstone of the Christian faith. I would even go so far as to say that if God had an active role in somehow altering events to eliminate “evil”, that would demonstrate unfair favoritism and also rob those evil souls the opportunity to be forgiven by God for their sins and be redeemed. It would contradict the faith of Christianity, and essentially break the religion.
Not to mention without evil, there would be nothing to which good could be compared. What point would there be to living if our actions were dictated by an unseen power?
I am more interested in more difficult questions to answer. My primary critique of Christianity is the source material. I don’t deny the existence of God outright, that would be hopelessly naive and senselessly negative. What I do question is, can a document that was hand-copied, hand-translated for nearly two millennia be trusted?
I’m sure you’ve heard this argument before. I must stress that there would be no malign intent, or that the scripture was at any point intentionally sabotaged. However, my concern would be that even a slight error in translation or duplication would result in potentially profound differences between the current and original work.
This is alarming considering how many different religious groups not only apply their own interpretations to scripture, but also rely on the validity of the words contained within. If you have any thoughts on this, I will be more than happy to listen as this has always been a large concern for me ever since I was old enough to work it out.
Monday, June 23, 2008 at
What? You don’t think government is going to save us all, like the rest of this country for some reason believes?
You don’t believe the beloved Al Gore is going to be the hero (he claims to be) to save the earth from the sun?
It’s almost like the people are just giving up. They are giving to wacky politically motivated garbage, so they don’t have to choose anymore. People seem to want LESS freedom by the looks of things to me. They want to be SAVED by government.
Our country is basically guided by mis-information while the media picks our candidates for us.
We, the people of the world are the only ones that are going to solve the worlds problems. It’s the only way it ever works. A free handout only robs us of the opportunity, and helps in the short-term.
As a Christian, I think the actual topic of this post is a bit straightforward and you answered it quite fine in about the first paragraph.
Essentially… Humans have free-agency. (Sometimes, we wish some of them did not though!)
The BIGGER question to me is why does the world for the most part not have an understanding of their role on earth? It is only through service to others that we are given the opportunity to grow as people. It is the true test. The true judgment of character. REGARDLESS of what race, creed, religion you are.
Monday, June 23, 2008 at
I do have some questions I hope you’ll discuss since you are on the topic of free will. Free will is the standard explanation of evil actions in the world and I personally think this is a reasonable explanation, but one that is hard to reconcile with some other standard concepts about God - in particular, a concept of heaven where people are transformed and have less sinful natures. If we can be transformed in this way without taking away from our free will, then why doesn’t God make us this way on Earth? The alternatives seem to be that either we do have our free will taken away somewhat in heaven, or that there is a comparable amount of evil in heaven as there is on Earth, or else only a truly small fraction of unsinful humans ever get to heaven.
Also, a related question is why is there so much suffering that is not caused by humans, e.g. hurricanes, etc. The standard answer here I think is that we only live on Earth for a short time and all the misery we endure will be negligible compared to eternity in heaven. But it still seems like a lot of suffering while we’re here - most religions certainly call for us to help others and ease their pain. If earthly pain is really so negligible, why should I give money to help earthquake victims in China? Other standard answers include that God works in mysterious ways and that if we knew everything we would see that it is all for the best, but this argument is very difficult to accept in the face of some truly devastating natural disasters.
Do you think there is an equally reasonable answer within reach for both of these questions?
Monday, June 23, 2008 at
Don’t forget the “problem of suffering” part of the PoE. That doesn’t necessarily involve the concept of free will or human actions at all.
Tuesday, June 24, 2008 at
joey as in Supervisor B joey? That’s my guess.
Thanks for the post. Good question bytheway and one that I’ve been working through lately. I would hate to give you a short answer when I feel like a question that is so frequently asked (and rightfully so) deserves a closer look. Would you mind if I made it the subject of the next part of this series?
Scot- so the government is not your idea of a 5-star day?
Help me understand what you mean by people’s “role” on earth (regardless of religion, creed, race as you said). Can you define that a little more?
Tuesday, June 24, 2008 at
Hey Pat- those are tough questions. I don’t want to drown anyone with a mile-long reply (nor do I have the time to fill one out) so i’m going to give you a link to an explanation that is in the ballpark of what I accept as an answer for your first Q, and then I’ll directly answer your second Q. Fair enough?
First Q: http://www.comereason.org/phil_qstn/phi039.asp
If you read the link above and have questions or thoughts, I’d be happy to discuss them. I’m not meaning to imply that your question is a cakewalk- quite the opposite. Hopefully that read is a good starting place and we can discuss it from there if you want to.
My answer to your second Q:
I do not personally adopt that answer for unexplainable tragedy. I think one demonstrates a lack of compassion when they (not you) say that suffering is trivial because it’s dwarfed by some long-term grand scheme. While there certainly is comfort in believing (and seeing) that God can work good even out of unmeasurable damage and loss, it doesn’t replace the real human steps that need to be experienced afterwards- doubt, grief, loss, agony confusion and more. I find it to be pretty callous when people (like some prominent evangelicals) attempt to answer why tragedy happened as if that is sufficient medication.
So while God does work in mysterious ways, I’d rather not spend my time trying to convince myself or others that I understand his movements or reasons why. Being in relationship with God does not mean he lets us watch the master plan from his control tower. I’d rather resist the temptation to speculate about such hurricanes, etc and instead focus on what can be done to help afterwards- prayer, donations, help on the ground. Not that I’m saying that I don’t like your question, but rather that when I’m in a similar spot, I find that I only get so far by asking. It’s sortof a sticky thing because I think a relationship with God thrives when people are brutally honest with Him and ask tough questions and share total transparency about personal issues. So I applaud your desire to understand. One thing that I ask of myself in such times of questioning is- am I asking to test and push God or am I asking because I want to know Him more or get help? Why are we asking why- to push God away or to ask Him to come closer? In that way, the preexisting philosophy may find its desired answer: “God is mean” or “God is mysterious but good.”
If I ever lost a child in a flood, and some pastor told me “it was all part of God’s will,” I’d punch him in the face. But if a pastor gave me a hug and said that he didn’t know why it happened, but then asked “what can we do to help,” that would feel like the hand of God. Support and comfort don’t remove the grief or the questions but they do sortof change the grief because it’s no longer a solitary experience. You might see the mysterious answer as shallow but I have to admit that I don’t think a perfect answer exists in the face of massive tragedy.
There is a huge difference between God being able to make good out of a horrible mess after the fact, and the implication that God forces havoc on us for a lesson. And what if he does, or ever has? What if a tsunami were God-authored while others were sortof auto-piloted, or existed outside of God’s direct influence? How can I possibly know? I also cannot possibly calculate the loss vs. longterm gain that God might work from such a horrific event- I am too small, live too short of a life and can’t know all the data surrounding it. So I am saying that I respect your question and the vast nature of the implications but for me personally, I have no inevitable choice but faith. That’s not the end of reasoning or wonder; just the personal acknowledgement that I cannot possibly prove or disprove Godly motivation or work. We certainly have The Bible as a guide but I’m pretty weary of using it for questions like this because I think you’ll find examples that both work for and against any given conclusion. For all we know- anything that we see as “coincidence” might have all been God acting intimately all along, or maybe all the things that we took to mean “God’s work” were just coincidence.
I want to remember that the foundation of my relationship with God is personal repentance and my change towards Him with His help and unearned grace. So for that to begin, and then for me to ask questions in a way that limit’s God’s ability to act as he sees fit- that’s working against the foundational principle of the relationship. I always feel weird in answering a question with “faith,” because I tend to hate that answer from others. In this case it works for me, but only because an answer that wins concensus can’t be found. In other words, “no one knows why” might comfort one victim and infuriate another, but does that mean that the answer was universally wrong (or right)?
Lastly- it is okay that things can be hard to accept. We sometimes want to sort it out, and end up feeling guilt if we can’t make sense or find peace when something goes bad. But maybe that’s faith- not the absense of conflict or pain but the balance of hope along with what’s unknown or unresolved. So not that we will “get” it all but that in the midst of confusion there will be trust and hope in God’s understanding and power to heal.
Looking forward to your thoughts on this, Pat.
One more thing and a little self promotion- I wrote a blog about this topic awhile back. If you’re interested, give it a read:
http://brokentelegraph.com/2008/04/28/get-well-now/
Modus- nice to see you away from Bad’s blog. Forgive me if I’m totally confused- what is the PoE?
Tuesday, June 24, 2008 at
Sorry. Problem of Evil. I’m a rampant abbreviator.
Tuesday, June 24, 2008 at
Modus- What about the Problem of Wikipedia? Can one overuse it too much? And if so- is that evil?
Tuesday, June 24, 2008 at
Yup. It’s an okay place to start, but the “internets” have more “sites” that specialize in “subjects” of one kind or another, and while the “nerds” of wikipedia strive for accuracy, sometimes mom calls them for dinner before they can double check their “edits”. Alternately, there are also things called “books”. Unfortunately, they don’t fit on the “internets”, even if you have the “broadband” (except, of course for sites like googlebooks, a handy site for books that have fallen in to the public domain. All the books there are still missing their smell. Books smell like books, you know).
Wednesday, June 25, 2008 at
LOL
Ever done a virtual surf through a series of tubes? I hear that smells like FiOS.
Thursday, June 26, 2008 at
Always interesting. My basic questions most resemble those posted by Joey. Since the beauty and wonder of God has never been lost on me… my questions are more about the literal acceptance of documents written and translated by man. How can we possibly begin to understand such an omnipotent and grand force? (Toes still up to the edge….and looking up and down and all around.)
Blaming or questioning God about tragic events does not make sense to me. My interest or search does not stem from needing things to be “fixed” or “understood”…Perhaps my fear is the mystery and wonder of such a force is lost when people define and interpret and judge others according to the written word.
Enjoyed every post on this. Reminds me that people are constantly churning and searching..much like I am.
Friday, June 27, 2008 at
Heya Beth-
your questions make sense. Let’s definitely *attempt* to look at that issue next. I’m fascinated by it.
-ian
Wednesday, September 24, 2008 at
Ian,
This is my first visit to your site and I enjoy hearing your thoughts. You’ve spent time thinking seriously about a lot of important issues.
I know this is an old thread, and this comment will go largely unnoticed, but I wanted to suggest considering another line of thought.
Human free will offers some help in understanding the existence of evil, but I think that help is limited. If we accept everything that the Bible says about God’s power and goodness, which I do, there are still some major unanswered questions.
I have nothing at all to do with the following websites, I simply think the articles present another way to view theodicy and yet remain faithful to everything the Bible says about God’s sovereignty and human responsibility.
http://www.leaderu.com/theology/theodicy.html
The second article focuses on and further develops the idea that there are two different ways that God wills things, an idea introduced in the previous article.
http://tinyurl.com/3a7hye
I hope that’s all of some benefit.
Wednesday, September 24, 2008 at
I like your picture on asking God to end poverty while we sit on the couch. Can we truely expect God to fix something if we don’t first act.. its that like that old saying you cant twin the lotto with out buying a ticket.
“Lastly- it is okay that things can be hard to accept. We sometimes want to sort it out, and end up feeling guilt if we can’t make sense or find peace when something goes bad. But maybe that’s faith- not the absense of conflict or pain but the balance of hope along with what’s unknown or unresolved. So not that we will “get” it all but that in the midst of confusion there will be trust and hope in God’s understanding and power to heal. ” this is very well said. I don’t believe we can truly learn teh beauty of a happy time with out knowing some sorrow. Can we truly appreciate the sun with out the rain? or vice-versa?
And whats wrong with answering a question with faith. Sometimes it takes faith just to wake up in the morning. even if faith doesnt pertain to our belief in God. It takes faith to know we can work thru hard times in our marriages and faitht to know that its air we are breathing even though we can not see it. Faith is trust. Do we trust that no matter what our circumstances matter? I do. Yes I am small and mostly insignificant… but it is possible that something I do can effect the world.. even if I never see the fruits of that.
Anyways My pastor answers the question of why does God allow suffering quite well. His answer is a little less political than yours but I thought you might enjoy a similar yet different answer. Anyways You might enjoy his response. Check it out at : http://www.ac3.org/PDFs/Q&A/Why%20suffering.pdf
if that doesn’t work go to http://www.ac3.org/q&a.htm– its the question about halfway down the page
Thursday, September 25, 2008 at
Barry- welcome to the site and thanks for taking the time to weather this post (and the lengthy comments). Topics like evil, God and freewill are so vast that it’s very hard to distill them down to something consumable; for that reason your links are worth considering and are appreciated. It’s one of those questions that, even if we convince ourselves that we’ve solved it, remains at least a partial mystery until we face God someday. I hope to see you around the site in the future.
Kelli- great to see you taking a look at some of these older posts. thanks for expanding on my ideas; I like the way you articulated things.
As for my hesitation to answer the general public (meaning believers in God and also those who don’t) is that it can be a cheap “out” to always run to the conclusion “just have faith.” Some people are wanting to see the intellectual and rational side of a pursuit towards God, and I have a great respect for that thirst. But you are absolutely right that our daily lives are filled with faith-tasks.
Thanks for the links- I’ll give them a look.
-ian
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