Some Loving God

This "act of God" in Asia, which has taken the lives of 150,000 people and brought misery to millions, again challenges belief in the idea of an all-powerful, all-loving, ever-caring God. By Vincent Browne

How did an all-loving, all-caring, all-merciful God allow the tsunami catastrophe to happen, allow the lives of 150,000 people to be swept away in this "natural" disaster, allow the lives of over one million innocent children to be devastated. Why did this all-powerful, ever-seeing, loving God not intervene?

The Bibles is replete with instances in which this all-loving, all-powerful God intervened in the lives of human beings (see panel below). And intervened in defiance of the laws of nature. This God created the world in the first instance, out of nothing. Then created human beings. Caused confusion of tongues at Babel. Destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah. Turned Lot's wife into salt. Transformed the rod of Moses into a snake. Brought plagues to Egypt. Opened up the Red Sea for the Israelites to pass though. Caused water to spout from a rock. Withered a hand. Destroyed the army of the King of Assyria. Caused a virgin to give birth.

Jesus was responsible for numerous miracles, including raising people from the dead and of course, we are told, he himself rose from the dead and later ascended into heaven.

So it is not as though it would have been out of character for this God to intervene in the course of nature or that he did not have the power to do so.

Repeatedly in the Bible we are assured that this God loves us.

Psalm 141 (11) tells us: "the Lord delights in those who fear him, who put their hope in his unfailing love." What are those whose lives have been shattered by the tsunami and who had put their trust in the unfailing love of this God to think now?

In the epistle of John (4.9) we are told:

"This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins".

How did this God that so cared for humankind as to send his Son among us to make the ultimate sacrifice to save us from our sins, not save the 150,000 people from the tsunami, did not spare the million children bereaved and traumatised from this misery?

There is a further difficulty.

Remember when Jesus was asked by one of the Pharisees which was the greatest commandment, he replied: "Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.' This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: 'Love your neighbour as yourself.' All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments."

If this is the greatest commandment, the greatest ethical precept, how then can this God himself defy that? If one of us failed to intervene to prevent a neighbour from a catastrophe, when we had the power and opportunity to do so, would we not be failing in the command to love our neighbour? Likewise is this God himself not defying that commandment in failing to intervene?

The traditional response to the incongruity of evil in the world and the existence of an all-powerful, ever-caring God is a combination of the following: That God endowed humankind with free will which permits them to do evil as well as good and much of human misery is caused by the sinfulness of humankind; that the ways of God are mysterious and where there is apparent incongruity there must be faith that somehow there is an explanation.

The issue of sinfulness is irrelevant to natural disasters except in that it might be argued that the victims of the disaster are victims because of their sins. There are several objections to this. First, what justice is there in arbitrarily destroying the lives of some sinners and not of others? Then what about the children, those too young to have committed sin? What justice is there in destroying their lives?

Some Christians argue that people are predestined to sinfulness from the moment of their birth. If this is so, then what justice is there in punishing those who have no option but to be sinners?

As for the mystery and faith argument, we are at the same time advised that, alone among created beings, God endowed us, humankind, with rationality and this rationality enables us to distinguish between good and evil. Our rationality tells us that this God cannot both be ever-loving and all-powerful and allow natural disasters with such devastating consequences to happen. If there is any doubt about this, then there must be doubt about our ability to distinguish good from evil.

And a further problem.

If we are to believe the bible, this same all-loving, all-caring God did despicable things in history to thousands and thousands of innocent people.

Take just two examples.

The first concerns the story of the Flood and of Noah's ark. It has some parallels with the horror of the tsunami. The Book of Genesis chapter 7 states:

"For forty days the flood kept coming on the earth, and as the waters increased they lifted the ark high above the earth. The waters rose and increased greatly on the earth, and the ark floated on the surface of the water. They rose greatly on the earth, and all the high mountains under the entire heavens were covered. The waters rose and covered the mountains to a depth of more than twenty feet. Every living thing that moved on the earth perished – birds, livestock, wild animals, all the creatures that swarm over the earth, and all mankind. Everything on dry land that had the breath of life in its nostrils died. Every living thing on the face of the earth was wiped out; men and animals and the creatures that move along the ground and the birds of the air were wiped from the earth. Only Noah was left, and those with him in the ark. The waters flooded the earth for a hundred and fifty days."

The other story is of the Passover, much celebrated in Jewish and Christian traditions.

We are told in chapter 13 of the Book of Exodus how the Lord instructed Moses to tell the Israelites that on the tenth day of the month to take a lamb ("without defect") and slaughter it and paint it on the sides and tops of their door frames. A whole litany of further ritual was then instructed. The point of the exercise was to distinguish the Israelites from the Egyptians, whose Pharaoh would not let the Israelites depart.

"The story continues that midnight on the appointed day: "the Lord struck down all the first-born in Egypt, from the first-born of Pharaoh, who sat on the throne, to the first-born of the prisoner, who was in the dungeon, and the first-born of all the livestock as well. Pharaoh and all his officials and all the Egyptians got up during the night, and there was loud wailing in Egypt, for there was not a house without someone dead".

The celebrated Passover was the occasion of mass infanticide, according to the Bible.

Our rationality and the Bible tell us there is no loving, all-powerful God who intervenes in our lives, who cares for us, on whom we can depend.