How does one retain faith in the face of evil/suffering?

[DerekG]

I suppose I'm something of a caricature, the nonbeliever whose loss of faith stems not from anything so noble as reason, but rather from an all-encompassing grief. I reached a certain point where the meaningless suffering and incomprehensible evil I witnessed (and in my own way, tried to battle and allay) drowned out the light. The conceit of redemptive suffering--the very crux of Christianity--suddenly seemed feeble if not outright false.

The dissolution of faith was agony for me, and it wasn't so much the modern atheists who provided comfort--my divorce was emotional, not rational--but older apostates like Voltaire and Twain. They spoke from anger and melancholy; to me they almost come across as spurned lovers--living, breathing Ivan Karamozovs--rather than stoic rebels. Their pain is mine.


My question to believers: How do you reconcile the existence of a higher power with the reality of suffering and evil?

My question to agnostics/atheists: Is your position primarily predicated on the moral outrage of which I speak?

(Please note: My intention is NOT to challenge or contest anyone's belief/nonbelief system. I am genuinely interested in how people confront the Problem of Evil.)

[cbayer]

1. There are many who share your experience, while others

find their faith strengthened by suffering.

I think belief and/or faith may be innate characteristics to some degree and for some people.

Everyone reaches their own position vis a vis religion from a variety of sources and paths, no two identical.

The question of evil is an eternal one. I have seen many explanations for it from believers and have heard many an atheist talk about how their inability to reconcile this led them to atheism.

There is no right answer. The only thing that is right is what makes sense to you.

[earthside]

2. An Evolution.

From conservative Missouri Synod Lutheran to non-theist in 57 years.

I was born into a Missouri Synod Lutheran family and took great comfort and pride in my religion for many years. After marriage and children the importance of 'faith' and religion for me became increasingly irrelevant ... these were ideas and concepts I thought important, but just didn't think much about anymore.

My father's diagnosis and decline into Alzheimer's Disease, however, brought these notions back and the Problem of Evil really did become the question that led me to finally comprehend that there isn't a god.

Once I intellectually realized that there just isn't any objective evidence whatsoever for the existence of a 'supreme being', it became so much easier to deal with the world and all of its frustrations and disappointments -- conversely also how much more genuine happiness, joy, pleasure and contentment have become.

Because ... trying to struggle with why evil and pain and suffering can exist in a universe supposedly created by a justice and loving god is, well, a struggle and a morass of theological explanations and contrivances that cannot bring either intellectual or emotional satisfaction.

How the god of Lutheranism, in my case, could permit a 'born-again', forgiven man like my father to descend into the nether world of Alzheimer's is simply not explainable by 'free will' or 'original sin'. There is only one forthright, clear, rational explanation for suffering and evil: that is just the way we are; that is a fight for us as a species to make to lessen the pain and injustice on planet Earth.

So, I am now to the point where (not in a condescending sense) I feel kind of sorry for the god-believers who twist themselves in knots to try and find solace in their sister's cancer (for instance) because it is somehow "god's will" and that somehow "it is all for the best" and how such a painful affliction is a 'mystery'.

It is a profound feeling of freedom and peace that comes from finally letting god go.

[DerekG]

5. I never gained a sense of freedom and peace, myself

As a Christian, I was tortured by the Problem of Evil; now, as an agnostic, I'm tortured by the arbitrary misfortunes that befall people.

Even the "make the most of life" credo fails to diminish the despair I harbor. Some folks never had a chance, and I find that sad reality unbearable.

[Cartoonist]

3. The powers that be

Religion was created to pacify the downtrodden. By promising them a better life after death was supposed to make it easier to accept their miserable life on Earth. It also created a labor force (priests) that would be paid from the bottom up (tithes), keeping the downtrodden, down.
It is my contention that the Americas below the Rio Grande are third world countries because they are still ruled by the Pope.
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The faithful get tied up in knots about evil because it is one of the proofs against their belief. Like "Intelligent Design" it is a paradox that proves the opposite of what it is intended. If life is so complicated that it must have been brought about by intelligent design, then who created God? If the universe did not exist before God created it, then God must have created evil. Also, if God is omnipotent, then you can toss out such concepts as free will and original sin because God knew it was going to happen.
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You didn't touch on what drove me away from religion. The idea of God as someone to WORSHIP. I guess being omnipotent means God has the most fucked up ego of anybody. He was lonely, so he created all of us just so he could have millions of people kneeling down before HIM. I never asked to be born. I never asked for a lifetime of struggle and hardship. I don't owe God a damn thing. In fact, since he supposedly created me, then he is responsible for my well being. He's done a lousy job.

[Silent3]

4. Evil and suffering only contraindicate a compassionate all-powerful God

Not that I believe there are any deities of any kind whatsoever, but evil and suffering still leave room for an indifferent or a sadistic god, or a deity with limited power to intervene.

That raises the question, however, of whether an entity lacking either compassion or omnipotence can reasonably be called a god. It's not the god of most modern monotheistic traditions.

The typical "God works in mysterious ways" explanations for how God can be both compassionate and omnipotent, while still allowing all of the suffering we see and experience, strike me as incoherent, desperate and lame.

[AtheistCrusader]

6. I idenfity strongly with the imagery the character of Ivan puts forth.

I diverge in that, I go one step further, and while I don't believe, if I did, I would hold the god of the Abrahamic faiths to be the most abhorrent hypothetical supreme lunatic ever conceived. Ivan wants to believe, or does believe, but does not accept the Christian scapegoating proposition.

As a person who has always been an atheist, I'm one step back from that. I've never believed at all, but if I did, hypothetically, I am familiar enough with the concept that I know I would reject it utterly, even if I could be encouraged to take it seriously.


The 'problem of evil' reinforces, but is not the source of my lack of faith. So too, is heaven, as was recently brought up, because sin is often considered an outgrowth of knowledge and will. Heaven has no sin. SO I sure as hell don't want to go there, as apparently one must surrender either or both knowledge and will at the door. Pass.


I find Ivan's proposition a useful illustration for the inherent immorality of the christian scapegoating proposition of jesus's preordained and inevitable torture, murder, and resurrection as payment for our 'sins'. It is interesting that even though Dostoyevsky was a christian, he provides one of the strongest rhetorical attacks upon christianity I have ever seen.