Why does God allow tragedy?

[The Great Open Dance]

God knows that love is dangerous.

In 1991, a vibrant eleven-year-old named Rossi was rehearsing for his school play in Virginia Beach. More spirited than prudent, he decided to work his way across the support beam that hung twenty feet above the stage. He fell and landed on his head. They rushed him to the hospital, and his community prayed, and his doctors struggled, but on the third day, Rossi died.

Many members of the boy’s church believed that Rossi’s death was the will of God, and they wondered how God could let this beautiful boy die. They assumed that God is controlling, and they couldn’t imagine an uncontrolling God. Stung by their loss and heartsick for Rossi’s family, they were tempted to walk away from faith.

But their minister disagreed with them about the nature of God. He thought that Rossi’s death was a tragic accident, over which God weeps with us. He believed that that tragedy was caused by the physical laws of the universe, those laws that govern the cosmos and render it harmonious. According to this minister, the purpose of those inescapable laws is the creation of freedom, consequence, and community.

The physical laws of the universe are unbreakable to create a shared stage upon which we act.

Physical law creates freedom because, within a cosmic order, we can (partially) anticipate the outcome of our actions, so that it matters what we do. Chaos would assign a random outcome to any action we took and deny significance to our activity. But physical law creates one common backdrop against which all persons act out the cosmic drama. Without this cosmic reliability, reason could not be rational, virtue would have no virtuous outcome, and chaos would deny consequence. Without the physical laws of the universe there could be no individual freedom or functioning community.

Some philosophers propose that the universe is unreal, an illusion to be overcome. But faith trusts that physical law governs reality, not an illusion. We experience a real universe sustained by a real God to be experienced by real persons. Because all is real, all is important. We cannot dismiss the suffering and injustice in our world as inconsequential. We must take upon ourselves the concreteness of our lives, both individual and social, and work to improve them.

Our interpretation of reality may distort it, projecting our own illusions and addictions onto its willing screen. But these too can be cleansed, partially and effortfully, in community and over time. Reality gives us a truth to approach, just as careful observation, different perspectives, and reasoned analysis grant us the means to approach it.

Escapist fantasies are great—as escapist fantasies.

Yet, if physical law is so essential to our well-being, then why do we fantasize about escaping it? Why do we thirst for a magical universe in which we—the clairvoyant, time traveler, individual superhero, or powerful wizard—bear greater power than the actual universe would ever afford us?

Certainly, we love stories and the occasional escape. But such thirst can also suggest our own selfish desire to be unbound by that which binds us all. We want to break the divine law that provides for our common good. We want to rule as monarch rather than cooperate as partner.

Or maybe we want the laws to bend, just a little, just this once, to save the life of a beautiful eleven-year-old boy. Rossi’s pastor, Rev. Dr. Clement A. Sydnor III, my father, wrote:

You might be thinking, as I have thought, “If only God had suspended, only for a second, natural law, the law of gravity, we would still have Rossi with us. His mother and brother and uncle and we who love him so, would not be hurting as we are.” . . . But God does not suspend the laws that God has established. If God suspended those laws, then our universe would no longer be dependable and predictable. Anxiety and anarchy, confusion and chaos would mark our world and characterize our relationships.

Order is the precondition for harmonious relationality, be it of the divine cosmos or human community. It is a gift from God, even when it allows tragedy.

Although we may buck against our cosmic constraints, physical laws are not a prison of predictability. They make any activity consequential, hence meaningful, and free us from the randomness that would make true relationship impossible. The will to power may crave freedom from the equalizing rule, and compassion may even want to bend the law on occasion, but (in the end) love accepts the divine order as the blessing it is.

Moral law is breakable to allow human freedom.

In addition to unbreakable physical law, Abba (our creating and sustaining God) has also infused the universe with breakable moral law. Moral law is that manner of conduct that grants us our greatest fulfillment, both as individuals and societies.

The moral law is love. Christ came to give us abundant life (John 10:10). If we trust his words, then we realize that the purpose of the moral law is not to restrict our actions but to increase our vitality. We can only flourish together. As individuals, we come to the fullness of life through love; as communities, our joy increases as the cosmos evolves toward the divine pattern within it.

Yet, unlike natural law, the moral law is entirely breakable. Instead of loving God or neighbor, we can hate both. Indeed, we can hurt both. We can choose evil. The inviolability of physical law makes our choices consequential, while the violability of moral law makes them free. If the moral law was unbreakable, then we would be puppets, but God has no desire to be a puppeteer. The persons within the Trinity act freely and consequentially toward one another, as do we, who are made in the image of God. (adapted from Jon Paul Sydnor, The Great Open Dance: A Progressive Christian Theology, pages 89-91)

For further reading, please see:

Buber, Martin. I and Thou. Translated by Walter Kaufmann. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1970.

Oord, Thomas Jay. God Can't: How to Believe in God and Love After Abuse, Tragedy, and Other Evils. Grasmere, Idaho: SacraSage Press, 2019.

Oord, Thomas Jay. The Uncontrolling Love of God: An Open and Relational Account of Providence. Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic, 2015.

[Lovie777]

1. How do human beings hate so much?.....

[liberal N proud]

2. Hate is taught

No one is born with hate. The are trained to hate by their parents or through interactions with others who also learned to hate,

[Frasier Balzov]

3. Entropy actually made abiogenesis possible.

Sean Carroll has discussed this.

Even though things are inevitably flying apart, order and creation do appear through that very process.

[anciano]

4. Excellent OP....

the division of laws into "physical" and "moral" categories is a very clear and effective way to address the classical "problem of evil" paradox.

[The Great Open Dance]

6. Thank you!

[Karadeniz]

5. Prodigal son: the father/source/god never leaves its world. Never helps the

son, never sends him money, never sends anyone to see how son is doing. There are religions that tie a supreme, perfect creator/consciousness into this physical world, but Christianity isn't one of them. The writers of the parables decided a lesser deity called the demiurge, nickname the carpenter, had created the material world. Since the demiurge was removed from the perfection of the father/source, it created an imperfect world where bad things happen, armies trounce through villages, killing and stealing food, plagues take over, babies lose their mothers in childbirth. As in the prodigal son, the son/soul must get itself back to perfection on its own steam. The mechanisms of karma and reincarnation are how the soul perfects itself, bringing perfection to this world since soul creation comes from the father/source, not the demiurge.