I November the first 1755 there was a
terrible earthquake in Lisbon Portugal
the attempt lured itself last they say
about 10 minutes destroyed much of the
city but then as would be the case about
150 years later in San Francisco there
were terrible fires that broke out after
the earthquake they killed many more
people many of the survivors went to the
seashore to get away from the fires and
then a tsunami arrived and killed many
who are on the shore now this terrible
event sent shockwaves across Europe and
I mean that now metaphorically ascent
shockwaves through the intelligencia of
Europe because though people in the 18th
century may be in their ancient history
books and write about Pompeii or you
know ancient disasters no one had
experienced or heard about a disaster on
this scale how to reconcile it with
belief in a personal providential God
this began to preoccupy a lot of the
religious and intellectual leaders of
Europe many of major players the time
think of Kant and Rousseau Voltaire all
weighed in on this dilemma of the Lisbon
earthquake the basic conclusion was it
was irreconcilable with belief in a
personal providential God it just didn't
seem possible that such a God would
permit such a terrible disaster people
say well maybe you know in abstract the
God of deism a distant cosmic force but
not the personal God of the Bible it
just doesn't make sense well I thought
of the Lisbon earthquake the minute I
heard about this recent disaster in
Japan because it was an eerily similar
scenario with the earthquake itself
followed by massive destruction followed
by the tsunami and followed by the
inevitable questions about God and such
a disaster you know there are two very
easy options when it comes to this
question and you see them up and down
the ages
the one is to say well clearly it's
divine retribution clearly this is God
expressing his anger about something so
we saw for example in the wake of the
Japan earthquake there was actually a
governor a local governor in Japan who
spoke out and said this is divine
retribution
later he apologized for that but that
was his first reaction in our country
glenn beck said something similar
evidently that this was a sign of God's
retribution in other disasters of people
like Pat Robertson have chimed in you
know in a similar way
what's problem with that well the
problem with that is the Bible itself
gives the lie to it look in the book of
Job so job is this sort of archetype of
the suffering human being that's
undergone the worst sort of trials in
every way his friends and quotes come
along and they endeavour to explain his
suffering precisely using this kind of
logic clearly job you've done something
because God would only attack you this
way if you had done something and job
consistently and rightly says no and in
the book of Job gives a much more
nuanced answer to the problem it it
refuses this kind of easy option of
simply saying oh yes I know it must have
been God seeking retribution now I say
there are two easy answers that's one
the other one is the answer of the
agnostics and atheists that would simply
say well it proves obviously there's no
God or most likely there's no God how
could God ever be reconciled with such a
disaster I think the truth of it lies
beyond those easy options and our great
tradition articulates it rather
remarkably well here's the first
observation to make God can never be
construed as the cause of evil now two
reasons for that one is because God is
love that's all God is straight through
he's love therefore God cannot will
something wicked you can't say God is is
directly willing something evil the
second reason is that God is described
as being itself therefore God cannot
ground or cause
the non-being which is evil evil in the
strict metaphysical sense doesn't exist
it's a privation of the good we say it's
a lack of being that ought to be there
think of a cavity in a tooth you know
it's a lack of some integrity that ought
to be there so God as being itself can't
be the causal ground of evil that's why
we shouldn't talk about God causing or
willing directly evil or suffering what
do we say we say that God permits
certain evils in his creation to bring
about a greater good again it's a
category that makes sense I mean we see
that happening in our own life sometimes
certain evils have happened but out of
them come a greater good that would
never have happened without the evil we
know about that and let me give you a
framework maybe for thinking about some
of these really disastrous evils Hitler
Stalin you say well how could God have
possibly permitted what they did well
God wants the great good of free will he
desires us to be his his friends and not
just his puppets and therefore he wants
free will will see to want free will is
at the same time to allow for the abuse
of free will you can't have free will
without allowing for the abuse of free
will so you might say God allows people
like Hitler and Stalin and all sorts of
other wicked people so is to bring about
the greater good or to permit the
greater good of free will itself now
follow that line analogously John
Polkinghorne I've mentioned before is a
anglican priest and also a particle
physicist so he's a very high-level
scientist and a priest
he's written very provocatively on
religion science issues he says
analogous to this free will
explanation is what he calls a free
process explanation what do I mean I
mean that God wants his creation he
wants nature to have its own integrity
God lets it
be and lets it unfold according to its
own rhythms so this tsunami was caused
by an earthquake an earthquake caused by
the shifting of tectonic plates those
plates are ingredient in the very
structure of the earth the earth is the
way it is because of its relation to the
Sun and the solar system etc etc that
it's the result if you want of natural
processes that God has allowed to unfold
according to their own rhythms so God
allows the world to have its own rhythms
and processes even when these resultant
things that are from our perspective
both good and bad I'll give you an
example that I'm taking from poking horn
the very dynamic namely random genetic
mutation that gives rise to evolution
also gives rise to cancer and so it's a
natural process that has both good and
bad of consequences ok let me put a kind
of final broad perspective on this we
say God allows evil to bring about a
greater good there's a famous story in
the Chinese tradition that speaks of a
farmer and the farmer has a horse that
has run away his friends come and they
commiserate with him and the loss of his
horse he says we'll see a week later
that horse returns with three other
horses that he's brought back to the
farm his friends come and they say how
wonderful what good luck these new
horses have come he says we'll see his
son gets on one of the new horses and
rides around and falls off and breaks
his leg the friends come back and they
say how terrible what terrible lucky fan
he says we'll see a week later the
officials from the government come to
draft the son into the army they
discover he has a broken leg they won't
draft him the friends come back and say
well congratulations what good luck he
says we'll see and the story goes on in
that vein
making a simple by the very penetrating
point that it's next to impossible for
us ever to read the full consequences of
an act or an event what appears to us to
be simply good or simply evil given the
way things unfold is never all that
clear so people of faith look at the
world now people of faith I mean people
that believe in God and believe in a
life that stretches yes even beyond this
one we look at the goods and evils of
this world and we say well what does it
all mean
we'll see we'll see what the effects of
even this terrible event in Japan are
and we'll see in light of God's ultimate
Providence of the universe
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