Why There is No Satisfying Answer to the Problem of Evil…
This essay proposes to address the traditional Problem of Evil as a challenge to the existence of a good and powerful God. We first examine the problem as given by arguments like McCloskey’s. We then consider if the real issue is not quite whether there is a logical answer to the problem, but whether an answer can be satisfying. Responses from religious sources that try to explain the suffering of the world are considered from examples as diverse as Buddhism, Christian Science and contemporary “victory” Christians, and the point made is that these “answers” fail because they do not take seriously enough the fact that we must hate the suffering and respond with a certain degree of outrage at the pain and injustice that spawns the problem in the first place. It is then argued that, in fact, atheism, too, fails in this same way. Thus the only adequate — but not satisfying — answer to the Problem of Evil must be one that takes suffering seriously and allows us an element of outrage. It is suggested that the story of the Christ — God Himself suffering for humanity — supplies the kind of answer we need, though we cannot, and perhaps should not, find it “enough.”
You can read the entire essay by clicking on this link: Problem of Evil