Sunday School: Suffering
Why if God is truly all Holy, all Loving and all-knowing does evil, injustice and suffering exist? Why do bad things happen to good people? Should evil be allowed to exist?
Before we discuss evil and suffering at a deeper level, we must discuss free will. God gave us the capacity to freely choose between Him and goodness or the world and evil. Adam and Eve were already made in the image and likeness of God. Satan tricked Eve tempting her to just eat this and “you will become like God.” As a result, Adam and Eve rebelled choosing their own path, the path of disunion and ultimately, death. God did not create evil, but by giving us the capacity to choose, he allowed us to choose it freely and thus evil entered the world.
Why does God allow evil to seemingly flourish? Wouldn’t a truly loving God intervene? Miraculous interventions do occur occasionally, but rarely. If miracles weren’t rare, wouldn’t we quickly take them for granted? To prevent evil, God would have to constantly interfere with the exercise of free will. God does not want robots, he wants his flesh and blood, beautifully made, but sometimes rebellious children to turn away from their own path and to live a life of self-sacrificial love for the other.
God wants us to freely choose to live our lives in communion with Him and our fellow man. Our Byzantine Catholic Faith teaches we can live a “grace filled” life of self-sacrificial love where lives and persons are transformed by the healing touch of His Sacred Mysteries. Love desires to be loved for its own sake. True love requires sacrifice, as in the parable of grain of wheat. When we die to self, new life comes forth in abundance.
An introduction to Byzantine Vespers from Sister Vassa:
