Personal Creeds and the Problem of Evil part 3

"Cause and Effect"

I have heard a number of answers to “the problem of pain”, some in academic essays, others in casual conversation, discussion board posts, etc. Generally, Christian books and speakers on the topic make a distinction between intellectual answers and pastoral answers. That is, some answers are for satisfying the intellect, others for satisfying the suffering heart. I’m not a big fan of this distinction for a couple of reasons. The first is that I’m never quite sure if I’m dealing with someone who regards pain as an intellectual query, or someone who is currently bleeding inside. Treating a bleeding heart like a research paper is insulting, and treating a research paper like a wounded soul makes you look stupid. Besides that, no one ever completely separates their heart and their head: my whole point in my first two blogs was to demonstrate that intellectual creeds and life experience and emotions go hand in hand in forming one another. So while the “heart/head” distinction might make for a well-organized speech or book, its usefulness falls apart in day-to-day conversation.

Allow me to examine one particular answer to pain as it relates to the heart and the head. I would call it either “the naturalistic answer”, or “the scientism answer” or “the cause and effect answer.” It takes several forms, but in general, it looks something like this: Death in Haiti? Plate tectonics. Car accident? The number of newtons it takes to shatter a rib cage.

I found this answer sustained my soul for a number of years, because most of my life’s “sufferings” consisted of brief pain. Some jerk makes a snide comment. I get a bad mark on a paper. I stub my toe. These are all easy enough to explain: “Bob is a jerk, caused by his jerk family that raised him”, “I failed the test because I didn’t study”, “Kicking someone in the butt hard enough will damage nerves and bones in my foot.” (That’s a true story btw.) In all of these, my pain is explained to my satisfaction, and the problem of evil bothers me no longer.

But then I experienced a new kind of pain: enduring pain. I would put things like the loss of a loved one, chronic disease, persistent psychoses and bad habits, and annoying relatives here -those kind of things, where the suffering doesn’t go away, and isn’t expected to until death.

To explain to someone with brain cancer that “That tumor will just keep growing until you die due to the rapid reproduction of cancer cells”, and expect them to be satisfied with your great insight and wisdom is a little naive.

Cause and effect is the most obvious answer to suffering. But it’s also the most obviously unsatisfying answer. Some commit themselves to this unsatisfactory answer, and talk themselves into being satisfied with it. Not to pick on the atheists, (Christians sometimes satisfy themselves with this answer too) but this was exactly the answer of Dr. Leikind, atheist and senior editor of skeptic magazine, in a debate on evil and suffering. Cause and effect -end of story, suck it up princess.

While reading some epic Greek poetry, C.S. Lewis found himself swept away in longings for a different world. It was here that he found his atheism glaringly inadequate -for what natural processes could possibly have created a being which longs for something that does not exist?

The very popularity of the question of evil testifies to the human heart needing more than a cause-and-effect answer. Pain and evil demand an explanation: some seek to exact that explanation from God, others chalk it up to the mysterious and eternal laws of Karma. Cause and effect is an inadequate answer, if for no other reason than the extent to which we cry out for a better one.