On June 24, two powerful earthquakes in neighbouring Venezuela left close to 2,000 people dead. Earlier, on June 5, Guyana was shaken by the killing of a seven-year-old boy during a home invasion at Zeelugt, East Bank Essequibo, in which his grandmother was also injured.
Such tragedies make us ask, “Where was God?” “Why didn’t he stop it?” Have you ever found yourself asking similar questions? We ask this when we see war, natural disasters, robberies, fires, or people suffering from cancer or other diseases.
If God is all good and all powerful, why does he allow so much suffering, especially of the innocent?
Jesus also faced this question. In Luke 13:1–5, people told him about Galileans whom Pilate had killed. Jesus then mentioned eighteen others who died when the tower of Siloam fell. In both cases, he made it clear that they did not suffer because they were worse sinners. Tragedy is not a direct punishment for specific sins. Instead of blaming the victims, Jesus called everyone to conversion. Guyanese sometimes say, “Is he deeds got he so!” However, when suffering comes, our first Christian response is not judgment but love and support for those who suffer.
What We Believe: God Did Not Create Evil
The Catechism says that “illness and suffering have always been among the gravest problems confronted in human life” (CCC 1500). Suffering exposes our weakness and can lead to despair or even revolt against God. Scripture does not hide suffering as seen in the story of Job or even in some of the Psalms. Jesus prayed Psalm 22 from the cross, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Mark 15:34).
God is good. He is the author of life, not death. When God looked at creation, he saw that it was “very good” (Genesis 1:31). The Book of Wisdom says, “God did not make death, and he does not delight in the death of the living” (Wisdom 1:13). God did not invent cancer and does not enjoy earthquakes. God is not laughing at human pain or saying, “This will teach them a lesson.” That is not the loving God revealed in Jesus Christ.
Original Sin and a Wounded World
So where did suffering come from? The Church teaches that sin has wounded us. Original sin is the wounded condition inherited by humanity because of the first turning away from God. St. Paul says, “The wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23). This does not mean every tragedy is punishment for personal sin. Jesus rejects that idea in John 9:1–5 when the disciples ask whether a blind man sinned or his parents sinned. Rather, original sin means that human nature is now “subject to ignorance, suffering and the dominion of death” (CCC 405).
St. Augustine taught that evil is not something God created. God did not make hatred, murder, or disease and place them in the world. Evil is a disorder in something good.
First Response: Free Will
One major Christian response to evil is free will. God created us free because love cannot be forced. A person who cannot choose is not truly free to love. But freedom also means the possibility of choosing selfishness, greed, hatred, violence, and sin. Much suffering comes not because God fails to act, but because human beings use freedom badly.
Wars, robberies, corruption, abuse and murder are moral evils. They are not God’s will. They happen when human beings reject love of God and neighbour. We should be careful not to blame God for our choices. God gives commandments, conscience, grace, Christ’s teaching, and the Holy Spirit. He does not turn us into puppets and force us to do things.
Second Response: Divine Providence
Free will helps us understand moral evil, but what about earthquakes, sickness, and cancer? The Catechism says creation is “in a state of journeying” toward its final perfection (CCC 310). God created an ordered world with real laws of nature. The same natural world that makes life possible can also involve earthquakes, storms, disease, and physical decay while creation still awaits redemption.
However, people ask, if God can intervene, why does he not always intervene? The Church speaks of providence and mystery. God’s ways are not our ways (Isaiah 55:8). We see only part of the story, while God sees the whole. God would never permit evil unless he were powerful and good enough to bring good even from it (CCC 311). This does not make evil good, but God can bring light from darkness.
Third Response: Christ Is With Us
Looking at the cross, we might ask, “Why did the Father not remove Jesus from the cross?” Yet from the greatest evil; the killing of the innocent Son of God, God brought our redemption. The resurrection reveals that evil does not have the final word.
This is redemptive suffering. It does not mean suffering is pleasant, that we should seek it, or that we should refuse medicine. Jesus healed the sick. He touched lepers, gave sight to the blind, raised the dead, and showed compassion to those in pain. He bore our infirmities and carried our diseases (Isaiah 53:4).
God is with us in our suffering. In Jesus Christ, God entered human pain from the inside. He knew hunger, grief, rejection, betrayal, torture, and death. Sometimes he heals immediately. Sometimes he strengthens us through doctors, medicine, family, prayer, community, and the sacraments. Sometimes he gives us the grace to endure what we cannot yet understand.
How to Live It
The Christian answer is not a neat explanation that removes all pain. The question of evil is a mystery. A grieving mother does not need a lecture on free will. A terminally ill patient does not need many pious words. They need presence, compassion, prayer, and practical help.
What should we do? We should pray and refuse to blame victims. We should use doctors, medicine, counselling, science, and community support. We should fight moral evil by working for peace, justice, protection of life, and care for the vulnerable. When suffering cannot be avoided, we should unite it to Christ.
As Christians, we stand with Mary at the foot of the cross. Christ does not always remove the cross immediately, but he never leaves us to carry it alone.
