It's all a mystery, for sure.. the humans created that have such destructive and self-focused tendencies, the brains that can be so manipulated and reactive... the pain in our bodies and inflicted, the inequity even from the moment of birth.. the disasters that wipe out the innocent. Is it really that God has "higher ways?" or should we just say that the God we worship is the one that created this situation, is a hands-off creator, and we will never know why. .. at least not in our mortality. I suppose that living by the words of Jesus is even harder, given this situation.. and makes the eye of the needle that much smaller.
I heard this passed on this year, I think from John Zahl: "For whatever reason, God doesn't seem to be all that interested in preventing suffering. But he seems to be very interested in redeeming it."
I have recently been taking a different approach to the problem of suffering. I think much of our distress about God's "failure to intervene" arises from two traditional errors.
First, we anthropomorphize God and then wonder how a just and merciful Person could be so capricious. We are constantly try to second-guess God's motives and intentions, and we submit to taking the blame for weak faith rather than blame God for failing to rescue us from the facts of mortality.
Second, we erroneously label the natural sufferings of mortal beings as evil, rather than welcoming the ever-present grace available to us to persevere as compassionate people in the midst of suffering.
"I’ve been learning recently that there is a prior, far more important ministry than seeking fixes. Before anything else, I need to sit with the suffering ones in their suffering. I need to let myself feel what they are feeling. If possible, I need to let them know that I am doing this....
"This is my first leading: to validate the hurt, the fear, the anger, the unanswerable grief. “Yes, your feelings are real and worthy of acknowledgement.”
"This is accompaniment. And this, in my experience, is what God does. Not intervention but compassionate accompaniment.
“No one can be open to healing until they know and feel their wounds. Feeling the wounds of others along with them, without rushing to fix things, offers them permission to go through this painful transition.
“And it says, 'I am with you, whether or not there is any remedy for this. I long for the healing of your sense of self, regardless of the scars.'"
It's all a mystery, for sure.. the humans created that have such destructive and self-focused tendencies, the brains that can be so manipulated and reactive... the pain in our bodies and inflicted, the inequity even from the moment of birth.. the disasters that wipe out the innocent. Is it really that God has "higher ways?" or should we just say that the God we worship is the one that created this situation, is a hands-off creator, and we will never know why. .. at least not in our mortality. I suppose that living by the words of Jesus is even harder, given this situation.. and makes the eye of the needle that much smaller.
I heard this passed on this year, I think from John Zahl: "For whatever reason, God doesn't seem to be all that interested in preventing suffering. But he seems to be very interested in redeeming it."
I have recently been taking a different approach to the problem of suffering. I think much of our distress about God's "failure to intervene" arises from two traditional errors.
First, we anthropomorphize God and then wonder how a just and merciful Person could be so capricious. We are constantly try to second-guess God's motives and intentions, and we submit to taking the blame for weak faith rather than blame God for failing to rescue us from the facts of mortality.
Second, we erroneously label the natural sufferings of mortal beings as evil, rather than welcoming the ever-present grace available to us to persevere as compassionate people in the midst of suffering.
As I wrote in the final post of my "Am I a Nontheist...?" series (see https://brightcrow.substack.com/p/am-i-a-nontheist-151):
"I’ve been learning recently that there is a prior, far more important ministry than seeking fixes. Before anything else, I need to sit with the suffering ones in their suffering. I need to let myself feel what they are feeling. If possible, I need to let them know that I am doing this....
"This is my first leading: to validate the hurt, the fear, the anger, the unanswerable grief. “Yes, your feelings are real and worthy of acknowledgement.”
"This is accompaniment. And this, in my experience, is what God does. Not intervention but compassionate accompaniment.
“No one can be open to healing until they know and feel their wounds. Feeling the wounds of others along with them, without rushing to fix things, offers them permission to go through this painful transition.
“And it says, 'I am with you, whether or not there is any remedy for this. I long for the healing of your sense of self, regardless of the scars.'"
Blessings, Mike