Why Do Some, or Many, Christians Believe that God Never Causes Harm and Suffering?

Je G Ro 9 hrs · Note that my purpose of this post is only to ask questions and not criticizing. It’s not clear to me why some progressive Christians believe that God never causes harm and suffering. Also, do you believe that God is incapable of it and incapable of preventing it? Mark Rego Monteiro It´s not a bad question. Here´s how my approach has developed. The physical Universe is what science has been studying, and is such a popular force in commercialized technology. I got my degree in Biological Anthropology, studying the evolution of human symbolic behavior, in fact, so that as my spiritual seeking continued, I got really interested. I also got a masters degree in International Relations, which got me up on key kinds of social theory. As I encountered the anti-theists in recent years, I began to sort it all out, and it sorts out very nicely, actually. "Science" turns out to actually be a modern name that hides what was originally called scientific "natural" philosophy. Darwin was still called a natural philosopher, just like Newton a century and a half earlier, and really, all the way back to Thomas Aquinas. Aquinas actually gave "science", ie scientific philosophy, its modern, Christian foundations in the Christianized First Cause. A lawful, loving Creator God created a lawful creation that could be studied for those laws. Darwin and Wallace´s evolution came just after new understanding of geology. The understanding of electricity gave us understanding of lightning, and thunder. That´s when Mary Shelley wrote Frankenstein, at the very beginning of the knowledge of electricity, just after Ben Franklin and then Galvani´s jumping frog legs. And that was just part of the whole adventure in University-based philosophical scholarship with empiricism. Hugo Grotius isn´t much talked about, but he came before John Locke, and is credited with advancing "natural law ideas." Descartes, for his part, is really well known for his initiating modern philosophy with his "I think, therefore I am." He was a French (Roman ?) Catholic living in Protestant Holland, to be clear. If it wasn´t clear, Thomas Aquinas was a Christian monk. Christians turned monastic schools into Universities. Petrarch is usually credited as a pioneering humanist before Galileo and Copernicus. He was, however, Christian. Back to Descartes, he is usually credited with the "Cartesian mind-body (and spirit) split" Pascal protested against his mechanicist language. That was all already after Luther´s inspired Reformation. But, then came Jefferson et al´s Civil Rights Freedom of Religion, the separation of church and state, and secular education. Social movements arose at the same time. God, however, didn´t part the Atlantic Ocean for the Quaker-Friends, including Quaker son Thomas Paine, agitating in the UK and North American colonies against slavery. The University people got inspired, holding things like essay contests, and one winner, Thomas Clarkson, a young graduate dissident Anglican of the establishment social circles, got sparked. He joined with the Quaker Friends in a Society and led the pioneering social movement of abolition in the 1780s. It moved, along with the North American movement with Lucretia Mott, and banned slavery by 1840 in the British Empire, along with the North American states also completing their diverse bans. The natural world has its lawful behavior, as God´s creation, the created physical Universe studied by scientific philosophy. That has been an amazing advance in Jesus´ legacy, actually, I have found myself in agreement with people like historian J Hannam in recognizing. Therefore, the importance of supporting eco-social justice, as Jesus demonstrated when gathering grain with the disciples on the Sabbath (Matt 12:1) is a key aspect of high Christian integrity, not actually "church piety." That has also pushed me to articulate more clearly than I´ve found the reality of spiritual-religious phenomena. I began finding spiritual psychosomatic healing material just out of college as an interfaith spiritual seeker interested in Unitarian Universalism. I found Bernie Siegel MD´s book Love, Medicine, and Miracles and OC Simonton MD´s The Healing Journey fairly early on, along with Louise Hay, a church of Religious Science innovative minister and her testimony of healing her cancer with a modern spiritual holistic approach. It involved a big dose of bodywork psychotherapy. Then I found a healing denomination with Reading Rooms for informal study, Christian Science. It´s called a "cult" in some circles, although it´s no worse than most groups of any kind and has plenty of healing and other miracles in written testimonies. That´s an exceptional example of pro-active and literate recordkeeping, as far as it goes. William James´ classic book actually includes CS material, as does a detailed book by journalist BO Flowers. Craig Keener, I found out in the last two years, wrote Miracles in 2011, a massive academic work that identifies medically attested, medically impossible healings with spiritual-religious testimony. There are more specific details to consider, but that gives my progressive empirical theism as an independent interfaith UU Christian. Many progressive Christians don´t have that much understanding of the reality of spiritual-religious phenomena, since science has been overemphasized and religion has been disproportionately influenced by profiteering businesspeople who fund anti-modernist Fundamentalism. That explains the modern progressive position, however. A lawful, loving God created the challenges of the physical Universe, and people have been presented with Free Will, especially in Jesus´ legacy. God can prevent harm, and southern Africa presents two compelling contexts. The farmer of the Film Faith Like Potatoes prayed for potatoes during a drought, I think it was. And Lord be praised, it happened. Spiritual healings also happened in his experience. Then came FW de Klerk in South Africa with apartheid. He evaluated the international context of protests, and paved the way to end apartheid. The South Africans also dismantled their nuclear program. A modern miracle, in its way. Another example might be Gandhi, who began his efforts in South Africa, before moving to India. Jesus´ legacy of loving integrity took ancient Greek philosophy at two points, as early as Paul and John the Apostles, and then again as Christians turned the monasteries into Universities with Thomas Aquinas. Christianized philosophy has become a powerful tool for developing Jesus´ legacy. It began as a spiritual practice, in fact, and can easily be resacralized by anyone interested in spiritual modernization. My interfaith Christian spiritual practice may have facilitated that for me. Thus, prayer is not usually enough for preventing harm in many contexts. However, it never hurts if it is done in combination with appropriate practical and lifestyle efforts. Social Europe´s advanced sustainability and social markets are an interesting context to consider, as is the US´s own corporate profiteering businesspeople dominated culture. God helps those who help themselves. That´s a modern expression with important import. Also important was the 1893 Chicago Parliament of World Religions, reflecting Jesus´ teachings of the Good Samaritan itself, which raises the meaning of loving thy neighbor as thyself to "love thy enemy." Similarly, if Jesus taught the importance of prayer as in "faith can move mountains," that also needs to be remembered and talked up in its ways.