Do you find it troubling that the poor, the old, the sick and the weak are disproportionately affected by diseases and catastrophes? Maybe not.
In what manner do you mean “troubling”. Troubling as a human being? Troubling as a Christian that believes God is good? If you mean the former than yes … But, by faith, since I believe in God, I don’t have the foresight and vast knowledge that He does. On the face of it, can look incredibly bad and that nothing good can come out of it. But God can take something that’s bad and turn it into something wonderful — I think the story of a Joseph says it best, “And Joseph called his name, Ephraim, for God, said he, Hath caused me to be fruitful in the land of my affliction.”
Sometimes people question why doesn’t God stop horrible murderers onslaught or stop thieves from ruining a persons house. It seems to me that some atheists want to have it both ways. They want God to grant us with free will so we can make our own choices yet simultaneously want God to be some sort of benevolent dictator that prevents anything bad from taking place.
Quote-unquote “natural evil” is a different situation because it doesn’t involve the free will of His creatures, but rather the own processes of His creation to, at times, cause devastating damage: Pompeii, Chixculub Crater are some examples. But again — it’s by faith that we establish their are reasons beyond our comprehension that these things took place … Pointing out various instances where horrible things took place isn’t nearly as “traumatic” when you take a step back and look at the grand picture. Why is it that every human that ever existed has to die in God’s creation?
Thankfully we live in the hope of a New Heaven and New Earth so this life isn’t the last chapter…
Respectfully, Tim
-Tim
@beaglelady
Luke 6:20 (NIV2011)
20 Looking at his disciples, he said: “Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God.
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Evil is translated from Hebrew meaning calamities not actual evil in the sense of satanic evil.
God allows nature a measure of freedom, and that can result in suffering. Plate tectonics is a good example. I certainly don’t believe that God runs around cracking plates together just for giggles.
You wrote, “God allows nature a measure of freedom, and that can result in suffering. Plate tectonics is a good example. I certainly don’t believe that God runs around cracking plates together just for giggles.”
I can understand where you’re coming from, Beagle. But the problem is that that statement is so vague and ambiguous that it almost doesn’t have any meaning. One can just arbitrarily say, “That right there. That was God’s handiwork. But that over there? Not a chance.” — I don’t see any biblical basis that would seem to suggest God has only a “partial grip” on Nature. And if the asteroid that hit the Yucatan peninsula was mere accident, then does that mean the human species was mere accident?
I find you a nice enough lady, Beagle. But I have to be honest here… Holding a conversation with you is difficult at times. I try my best to make a sound and reasoned argument for a certain premise, yet you respond in often very vague ways. I wrote an argument using Scripture and my own reasoning … But you replied to a seemingly less significant portion of my post and ignored the rest.
Sometimes I feel like my words are wasted…
-Tim
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Good article, James.
However, I don’t find what Eddie was saying about “nature evil” to be all that different than the meaning you get from calamity. In both instances something unpleasant takes place. Though of course one doesn’t argue that the “evil” has anything to do with Satan.
-Tim
I don’t think it was planned by God, no. Even Behe doesn’t think catastrophic asteroid strikes are designed. At least that’s what he says.
Whether or not asteroid strikes come from God, NASA really should make asteroid detection and deflection a high priority.
The old canard of “nature’s freedom”! Let’s expose it yet once more as the deceptive and incoherent snare it is.
Karl Giberson uses the idea a lot, but when pressed not long ago, finally admitted the obvious: that (given that nature is not an intelligent agent with free will, nor even are the powers within it, apart from us) “autonomy” is just a metaphorical way of referring to “randomness”. There can be no other meaning, unless you are an animist or a pantheist. Since “freedom” is not randomness, it’s a deceptive metaphor, capitalising on the attractivenss of “freedom” as a positive buzz-word.
That necessary admission makes the heart of the discussion clearer and less clouded by pink fog: when people say things like “God gave nature the dignity of freedom”, it really means “God subjected his creation to the bondage of irrational chance.”
What God does not govern purposefully is not part of creation (ktisis), but of chaos. Not only that, but it’s chaos lacking an explanation. God does not make chaos, so what did? It is therefore a dualistic alternative to God, a second power involved in creation (as indeed is even unwittingly admitted by those who use words like “self-creation” or “co-creation”).
Fortunately both Jewish and Christian teaching have made it clear from the beginning (as Tim and Eddie have pointed out above) that there is only one power in creation - the mysterious, and sometimes incomprehensible, wisdom of God. And in Scripture, the “wisdom” of God is closely allied to the “logos” of God: “without him nothing was made that has been made.”
Nothing.
One can try to filter out all those Scriptures that speak of these truths about God - includng the very words and acts of Jesus - but they remain there, stubbornly, on the page. In the end, one is seeking to save Christianity by destroying it piece by piece. Better by far to let God be God, and creation (even “evolutionary creation”) to be a created cosmos, not a random chaos struggling to understand in what sense it is “free”.
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Ted,
A while back I made the claim that results of a QM system are unknowable before they are observed.
Attached is a new results that pretty much prove this. This experiment leaves no wiggle room in meaning: entangled particles do behave randomly, and they synchronize without exchanging signals.
It seems like it is time to adjust the theology again to harmonize with the science.
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Patrick, I love your phrasing! The rumor is God gives a free year subscription to his
newsletter to anyone who accomplishes this! Well worth it, in my view … !
George Brooks
It is only a rumor. 
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And the fact that Michael Behe has confirmed under oath that the Intelligent Designer might be no longer living, or that there might be multiple, competing intelligent designers gives us a window into his theology.
If God really does lob asteroids at our home planet for any reason or no reason, we need to be ready for his next attack! Read about the New NASA Mission to Help Us Better Estimate Asteroid Impact Hazard. Deflecting a threatening asteroid is one idea, blowing it up is another. Just imagine, one day we might very well be competing with God in a game of Asteroids!