"Children's Coffins and God's Compassion"

Religion in Daily Life

© By the Rev. Edward Chinn, D.Min.

Rector, All Saints' Church

9601 Frankford Ave.

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19114

Written 2 November 2002

http://www.allsaintstorresdale.org

Tiny white coffins - 26 of them - were lined up in the gymnasium in an Italian town called San Giuliano Di Puglia. An earthquake on Halloween caused the sudden collapse of a nursery and elementary school there. This is one vivid instance of the fact that bad things happen to human beings. The victims of the Washington-area sniper are another example of life's injustice. This week I learned that a retired teacher whom I know, a "tangential Episcopalian" (to use his words), has been stricken by cancer. How can we see God as compassionate and caring in the light of human suffering?

I distinguish God's Aim from God's Allowance. I take "God's Aim" to stand for God's ideal intention for all his human children. I reserve the expression "God's Will" for this divine aim. I believe God aims at having creatures to which he gives freedom to choose their actions. I further believe God aims at perfect health for all humans. God's Aim is the intention of a Father who wants his children to learn to walk on their own. This is the image Jesus had of God: "If you know . . . how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good things to those who ask him" (Matthew 7:11)!

I distinguish "God's Allowance" from God's Aim. Like a human parent, God allows what he does not intend. For instance, God allows human sin, or humans would not have any real free will, but God certainly does not intend human sin. Like a parent whose little boy is learning to walk, God allows us to stumble and fall. Of course, these falls are not his aim. Think how often human suffering comes to us through ignorance, or foolishness, or sin. My father suffered from emphysema because he foolishly chose to smoke for sixty years. God allows the possibility for humans to misuse their freedom. Furthermore, God has put us in a natural world where its regularities - its "laws" - can cause human suffering. We can see such an interaction when an earthquake shakes a 50-year old school to which renovations in the last two years added weight to the original roof.

The cross of Jesus sums up this mystery of undeserved suffering. God sent Jesus to be followed, not to be murdered. This was God's Aim. But in the circumstances imposed on Jesus by evil men, God allowed him to be crucified. Beyond God's Aim and God's Allowance is "God's Achievement." God used the cross of Jesus to give us an unforgettable picture of God's suffering, invincible love . . . a divine love that raised Jesus from death. As Dr. Leslie Weatherhead wrote (and his thoughts are reflected in this piece): "The whole meaning of omnipotence is not that everything that happens is God's Will. Clearly, in a world where there is free will, where men learn slowly and make mistakes, where men act foolishly, blindly, uncomprehendingly, and sometimes sinfully . . . in such a world a million things can happen which are not the will of God . . . Omnipotence means that nothing that is allowed to happen has within itself the power finally and ultimately to defeat God" (Leslie Weatherhead, Salute to a Sufferer, p. 20).