The Nature of Suffering

All people in life experience some form of suffering. The form and intensity will vary greatly, but all will experience it. This mortal experience is rife with examples of cruelty, disaster, and tragedy of all sorts. For those who believe in some form of divinity, there looms the question of how a loving God can allow his children to experience so much suffering.
A wise man once taught that suffering comes from three sources in life. First, and if we are honest with ourselves, foremost, we suffer from the decisions we make and their subsequent consequences. We will often seek outside ourselves for blame, but at some level of honesty we realize that nobody else chose the purchases we made that lead us to financial ruin, the lack of competence that lost us the job, or the bad life style choices that lead to poor health. For these sources of suffering, success is in honestly admitting our mistakes and then dealing with their consequences and correcting them in our future choices. As long as we seek or accept the role of victim, we condemn ourselves to a life of hopelessness and despair and deny ourselves the opportunities that are only taken by those who choose to accept responsibility for their actions.
A second from of suffering comes from living in an existence where others make decisions that affect us and where the natural environment is prone to disasters. A driver runs a stop light and hits us. A dictator starts a war that leaves us homeless. Our child is killed in an accident. Severe storms rob us of our property and livelihood. In these things we really are victims, but the way beyond them is much the same as with suffering from our own decisions. The path of the victim is always down. The path beyond is always to take responsibility. In this case, we may not be responsible for what happened to us, but we are responsible for what we do now. We can choose despair and discouragement, or we can choose to rebuild, move on, and from doing so become stronger. Despite who may be to blame for what happened, we are to blame for what we do next. Nature is our example. As winter snows may destroy and bury life, nature uses this time to rebuild and turn the freezing snow into life giving moisture when the sun again comes out, as we may hope it always does as long as we continue to live.
The third form of suffering connects us back with God. Almost all the major world religions view suffering as a tool for refining the spirit. As such, suffering brings with it a deeper meaning. While I do not believe God wishes for his children to suffer, he does recognize and allow it for the greater good that comes of it. To understand that greater good, we must see this life not as a random flash of existence, but as a well designed test. In order to return to God in the fullness of joy, he allows us to be placed in situations where we will be forced to demonstrate the nature of our spirit. Two people can be placed in the same circumstances and react totally opposite. One may choose future happiness and joy, another despair and destruction. The nature of the experience is the same, but the choice of reaction is individual. Whether it be a concentration camp, or the birth of a child, all experiences leave us with a basic choice. We can choose to return to God through living love, or we can dam our progression by choosing selfishness in all its forms of apathy, hate, or fear. Such is the nature of our test. When seen from God’s perspective, all the trials of life become not some form of punishment or retribution, but opportunities to choose how we will spend the eternities. The question is not why we suffer or experience joy, but whether we use that test to come closer to God, or, as Job’s wife told her husband, “curse God and die!” Whatever your trial in life, choose happiness and joy through love.

The Nature of Evil

Having talked a little about God, maybe I need to say a word about the Devil, or more accurately, evil in the world. There is a philosophy growing in popularity that states that there is no such thing as good or evil, only actions and consequences. It further states that people, all people, act in their own best interest and according to their knowledge and abilities. The bottom lines seems to be that people aren’t wholly accountable for their actions and that their parents, society, the government, whatever, has messed them up and they are just doing the best they know how. So, rather than judge them and apply labels of good or bad, we should just try to understand them and fix the situation that made them like they are.

Well, I will admit that people are complex. What’s more, most of us do act in our best interest, whatever that interest is. I’ll even go so far as to say that we are influenced by the environment and people that surround us. Then again, not all people who are abused, abuse others. Not every poor person stays poor and not every rich person stays rich. Not everybody in a riot or natural disaster turns to looting. The bottom line is that regardless of our situation, education, or environment, we retain the ability and responsibility to choose how we will react and what actions we will take. And while the degree of culpability may vary, we remain accountable for our actions. It is that accountability that brings us to a definition of evil.

While I won’t quote him or give him full credit for my definition (he might disagree with me on particulars), I do owe gratitude to Dr. Scott Peck and his books, especially The People of the Lie, for one of the best secular discussions of evil. I admitted that we all act in our best interest, but evil comes in with how we choose to see our interests. The goodness of our existence comes when we see ourselves as not just individuals, but citizens and fellow citizens in a world outside ourselves. That world can be as narrow as with a spouse or a friend, and as broad as fellow residents of planet earth. Goodness demands that we recognize those external people and communities and consciously weigh the affects upon others of the decisions we make. Further, it demand that we do so without justifying pain or lose to another so that we can experience pleasure or gain. Evil, then, is taking action without considering others. Pure evil is taking action which we know will cause harm to others, or even ourselves, but we do so anyway because of what we think to feel or gain. And, the purest form of evil are the actions which not only recognize the destruction our actions may cause, but actions with that destruction as a goal.

Take a character like Hitler. People with the no-evil philosophy would say that Hitler’s persecution of the Jews was a result of a Jewish person criticizing his paintings and of being raised in a culture that saw Jewish gains as loses to the good people like himself. Maybe he was even told that Jews were bad because the crucified Christ. They would go on to say that Hitler’s actions were then justified, in his own mind, and not any type of evil intent on his part. Finally, they would say that if we can just destroy discrimination from our society and teach children to not result to violence or hate, that all the little Hitler’s would instantly be fixed. I believe that while such a view is appealing, it is unrealistic and ignores human nature. While a person who didn’t grow up surrounded by discrimination and hate might have less of a chance of turning out like Hitler, it still can and does happen because individuals are free to choose to give in to evil and to let evil govern their actions.

So how will evil be overcome? Here is the controversial opinion. I don’t think it ever will be in life’s present manifestation. I believe that it is the nature of our existence that some will always choose evil. I also believe that evil has been introduced or allowed into this life with the purpose of giving our probation here a choice. This goes back to my beliefs on the nature of life and our relationship to God, so I won’t go further at this time. I will say this. In terms of offering and making choices to not pursue or accept evil, we need to be governed by something akin to Asimov’s laws of robotics, adjusted to fit the situation. First, we should never do anything which causes pain or lose to another unless failing to do so would cause even more lose and pain. Even then, extreme caution should be taken since we can’t see the future or know all the ramifications. Second, when we can reasonably act to decrease pain or lose, we should do so. Failure to do so can be construed as allowing or promoting evil. Obviously there is a lot of evil out there and there is only so much we can do, but for most of us, we could do more. Third, we should not do that which results in evil to ourselves, unless failing to do so breaks the first two laws. Taking care of ourselves when it isn’t in conflict with the first law is almost never evil and the third law must be balanced with the second—life is not in need of many martyrs. There is, of course, a single word for the three laws. It is Love.

Is There a God

Is there a God? Let’s get right to the point. While religionist cannot offer conclusive evidence as to the nature of deity, neither can science prove God’s non-existence. The reality is that scientists have yet to establish the causal factor for existence. Not even string theory provides causal information, just some potential answers on the mechanics of the universe. Causal information is still a mystery. Even if I didn’t have strong spiritual feelings, I would have to at least admit to being a deist and bow to the mystery that science so far has not been able to touch. So yes, Virginia, there is a mystery that so far can only be answered by the concept of God.

Those who argue against religion, which is not necessarily the same things as a belief in God, say that religion is merely man’s attempt to ritualistically explain things that are outside his ability to understand and codify. Whether it be the Mother Goddess of prehistoric humanity, to the dwellers of Olympus, or to the pantheon of modern God’s and Godheads which continue to be the objects of worship, humans seem to have a need to see our existence as ordered and influenced by omnipotent forces that mortal man can comprehend and appeal to. God, then, becomes our conceptual attempt to order, and even influence things that would otherwise be beyond our control and outside our ability to comprehend. This argument rings of firm logic. I would only say that effect does not prove cause. As logical as it may seem that Religion is man’s attempt to explain the unexplainable, It is just as logical if we accept the concept of God, that man’s propensity to religion is God’s genetic gift to keep man in search of the creator.

Moving from logical to emotional arguments, detractors might ask why, if there is a God, does he/she/it allow so much suffering and catastrophe? And why all the mystery? If there is a God, why doesn’t he just show himself and settle the debate? These are also fair questions and I’m not sure I have all the answers—in fact, I’m sure I don’t, but I am willing to make them subjects for future posts.

Psuedo-intellectualism aside, I do not apologize for having strong spiritual feelings that are based on my personal belief and experience. I believe that our existence in the dimensions we occupy to be purposeful and part of a more comprehensive plan that can track the essence of our being long before our birth and that will influence the eternities beyond this brief mortal probation. Perhaps more on this later.

Which Political Party is Better

You notice I didn't say which party is best. No political party has a monopoly on correct thinking nor is devoid of mistaken perception. I serve in a non-partisan city council position in the small Idaho town where I live. I have come to see that there are seldom black and white realities to deal with. Political decisions are plastered in shades of grey and skewed by conflicting and often passionately held priorities. Some of those priorities include short term gains or losses weighed against long term needs and goals. There is always the judgement of how many minority interests should be sacrificed to the desires of the majority. And one of the hardest considerations is deciding when equality under the law isn't very equal and needs the flexibility of discretion in the face of individual circumstance. In the end, the best a politician can hope for is to gather enough accurate information to make a reasoned decision and hope that it turns out for the best, knowing that the sometimes harsh and often capricious hand of history will write the last word. I don't believe in party lines or grand philosophies that ignore individual circumstances. Sometimes the better decision is to do what is best for the majority, at other times, the better is to defend the minority against the majority. Many times the better is to do what hurts in the short run in the hope that it will make things better in the long. In other decisions, what makes a difference now is what matters. And while law, theoretically, is the great equalizer, a law founded on incorrect or narrow principles can ultimately only harm and deny justice.

You've probably guessed, by now, that I'm not going to start naming the better political parties. I personally don't feel a strong kinship with any party and can find both good and the repulsive in all the parties. As citizens of a free and representative democracy, we have the responsibility to get involved in the political process, to share our views, and support those individuals and groups that best represent our ideas of good government--being humble enough to admit the possibility we may be wrong. I would end by saying that those who don't work to get a well rounded view of the situation and then get involved and work for their idea of the greater good, lose the right to criticize and must accept the decisions of those who pay the price to be part of the process. Perhaps the better party is the willingness of the citizenry to be educated and involved.