Who is responsible for human suffering?
9/11: How could God let such a thing happen? /
Interview Anne Graham 00, 2002-07-08
The prayers of the Christian believer.
The death of innocent children.
People who are unable to believe. / Book
Wilhelm Busch pp 123ff.
Is Catholic moral theology right after all?
/ Reply Benedikt Kromlechner 00, 2003-10-13
Does it make sense for anyone to take the pill?
/ Reply Helga M. Vinagreiro 00, 2005-03-22
Some while back the Bavarian Abbess Assumpta, of the recently rebuilt Convent of
Helfta in Sachsen‒Anhalt, made the claim in a television interview that the question why God permits
suffering in the world is one to which, in the end, no human being can give an adequate answer.
Now this may well be true of the average man in the street, who mentions God only in the context of
swearwords like ‘goddam’ or ‘for godssake’, hardly being conscious when he does so that he
is actually speaking of God the Lord. But for the head of a Catholic convent, who at age 77 claims
to have been speaking to God on a daily basis for 40 years, to utter such an opinion is more than a
little surprising.
The question "Why does God permit suffering?" is frequently asked, and it comes more often than
not from people who have no religious belief, but who as a result of some painful event suffered by
themselves or those near to them suddenly find themselves wanting to raise the question of God.
This, though, can be compared with the question of the student who has flunked his high school
diploma: "Why did the teacher let me fail in Math?" Plainly the pupil has confused cause and
effect, and so betrays the fact that it is not just in Math that he has problems of comprehension.
Just as our pupil should have been working intensively on Math over the school year, so the person
who here finds himself wanting to arraign God because of a painful event that he has experienced
should have been looking for this same God at an earlier stage of his life. But at that time, of
course, he didn’t have any problems, and if he had been asked to devote just one day, out of the
thousands of days that he had lived, to the question of God’s existence, he would have seen it as
a complete waste of time. And yet even many individuals who have already engaged, more or less
intensively, with such issues, often voice the opinion that the Bible is a ‘book with seven seals’
and that God ‘in his transcendence’ is inexplicable (see the above‒quoted remark) and
inaccessible to human beings.
But we have not obeyed His voice.
Jn 9,14 "Therefore the LORD has kept the calamity in store and
brought it on us; for the LORD our God is righteous with respect to all His deeds which He has
done, but we have not obeyed His voice. Dan 9,14;
Here we can see an analogy between God and the domestic power supply. In every room
of the house we have a light switch. But if a person declines to press the switch, he has no cause
for surprise if he finds himself sitting in the dark. In just the same way, God may be reached by
any human being. But those individuals who have never before seen any reason why they should turn to
God are hardly in a position to complain now, if they find that they have no direct hotline. So when
they accuse God of responsibility for the suffering that they or those dear to them have
experienced, their complaint has been misaddressed. God is not the guilty party – it is they
themselves, who did not take any interest, while there was still time to do so, in this same God who
could have shielded them and those near to them from the experience of pain.
On this same subject, Billy Graham’s daughter Anne Graham stated her views in an
American television interview:
World Trade Center New York
Source: AFP_Archiv/Doug_Kanter
Billy Graham’s daughter Anne Graham gave a television interview on the events of
11 September 2001, on Jane Clayson’s Early Show. We would like here to give an extract
from her answers to the question "How could God let such a thing happen?"
Anne Graham:
I believe that God must be as deeply upset about this as we are. But over the years we have been
asking God increasingly to disappear – from our schools, our governments and our lives. And as
God behaves like a gentleman, he has quietly backed off. How can we expect His protection and
His blessing, when we just wanted Him to leave us alone?
I think it started when Madeline Murry O’Hare (she was murdered, they recently found her
body) complained about prayer in our schools, and wanted it done away with. And we said that was
OK.
Then someone said you better not read the Bible in school. And we said OK to that. Then they
told us we shouldn’t spank our children when they misbehave because their little personalities
would be warped and we might damage their self-esteem. And we said that was OK too. Then someone
said that teachers and principals had better not discipline children when they misbehave, and
the school administrators agreed to that – they didn’t want any bad publicity, and they
certainly didn’t want to be sued.
Then someone said, let’s let our daughters have abortions if they want and they won’t even
have to tell their parents. And we said, that’s a grand idea.
Then some wise school board members said, since boys will be boys and they’re going to do it
anyway, let’s give our sons all the condoms they want, so they can have all the fun they
desire. And we said, that’s another great idea.
Then some of our top elected officials said it doesn’t matter what we do in private as long as
we do our jobs and the economy is good. First of all pictures of naked women were printed in
magazines, and after that the entertainment industry set out to promote profanity, violence and
sexual perversity. And music recordings were made that encourage drugs, murder and satanism. And
we said it’s just entertainment, it has no adverse effect, and nobody takes it seriously
anyway, so go right ahead.
But now we are asking ourselves why our children have no conscience and are unable to
distinguish right from wrong. I think that we reap what we have sown.
"Dear God, why didn’t you save the little girl who was murdered in her classroom?"
Sincerely, a Concerned Student. And the answer came back: "Dear Concerned Student, I am not
allowed in schools. Sincerely, God."
It is strange how easy human beings find it to treat God like dirt, and then express their
surprise when the world goes to hell in a hand basket. Strange that we believe what we read in
the newspapers, but question the Bible. Strange that everyone who wants to go to heaven makes it
a condition that he should not have to believe, think and act as we are told to do by the Bible.
Strange that many people will say "I believe in God", and still follow Satan (who by the way
also ‘believes’ in God). Strange that coarseness, vulgarity and obscenity have an absolutely
free rein, while in schools and workplaces alike any open discussion of God is discouraged.
Strange that someone who on Sundays is a Jesus enthusiast can spend the rest of the week being
an invisible Christian.
Pass on this message if you think it has merit! If not, then just discard. But if you discard
this thought process, then don’t just sit back and complain about what a bad shape the world
is in.
(This interview is taken from the periodical "Philadelphia Kreuz und Reich", no. 1/2003.)
(Ernst Panzer info@philadelphia‒verlag.com / https://www.philadelphia‒verlag.com)
(See also Discourse 110: "The latent hatred of Christians
in the USA")
With God’s help, suffering can be prevented. Not only can believing Christians
confirm this truth on the basis of direct experience – we find the same promise in the Bible,
expressed in clear and unambiguous terms:
If you ask Me anything in My name, I will do it.
Jn 14,11 "Believe Me that I am in the Father and the Father is in
Me; otherwise believe because of the works themselves. 14,12 "Truly, truly, I say to you, he
who believes in Me, the works that I do, he will do also; and greater works than these he will do;
because I go to the Father.
14,13 "Whatever you ask in My name, that will I do, so that the Father may be glorified in
the Son. 14,14 "If you ask Me anything in My name, I will do it. Jn 14,11-14;
If you ask the Father for anything in My name, He will give it to you.
Jn 16,23 "In that day you will not question Me about anything.
Truly, truly, I say to you, if you ask the Father for anything in My name, He will give it to you.
16,24 "Until now you have asked for nothing in My name; ask and you will receive, so that your
joy may be made full. Jn 16,23-24;
All things for which you pray and ask, believe that you have received them, and they will be granted you.
Mk 11,24 "Therefore I say to you, all things for which you pray
and ask, believe that you have received them, and they will be granted you.. Mk 11,24;
And whatever we ask we receive from Him, because we keep His commandments.
1Jn 3,21 Beloved, if our heart does not condemn us, we have confidence
before God; 3,22 and whatever we ask we receive from Him, because we keep His commandments
and do the things that are pleasing in His sight. 3,23 This is His commandment, that we believe in
the name of His Son Jesus Christ, and love one another, just as He commanded us. 3,24 The one who
keeps His commandments abides in Him, and He in him. We know by this that He abides in us, by the
Spirit whom He has given us. 1Jn 3,21-24;
These New Testament assurances that God will grant our requests are not without
precedent. Long before, David was inspired by the Holy Spirit to say, in Psalm 37:br>
Delight yourself in the LORD; And He will give you the desires of your heart.
Ps 37,1 A Psalm of David. Do not fret because of evildoers, Be not
envious toward wrongdoers. 37,2 For they will wither quickly like the grass And fade like the green
herb. 37,3 Trust in the LORD and do good; Dwell in the land and cultivate faithfulness. 37,4 Delight
yourself in the LORD; And He will give you the desires of your heart. 37,5 Commit your way to
the LORD, Trust also in Him, and He will do it. 37,6 He will bring forth your righteousness as the
light And your judgment as the noonday. Ps 37, 1- 6;
This promise of God, however, does not apply to the whole of humanity. It
emerges plainly from the quoted passages, and from the context in which they appear, that
unbelievers cannot expect to be helped by the Lord:
- Jn 14,12 ‘… he who believes in Me’ (whoever believes in
Jesus Christ as his Savior)
- Jn 16,23 ‘… if you shall ask the Father for anything…’
(whoever is privileged to call God his "Father")
- Mt 11,24 ‘… believe that you have received them…’ (whoever
believes that he has received what he has asked for)
- 1Jn 3,22 ‘… because we keep His commandments…" (whoever
keeps God’s commandments)
- Ps 37,4 ‘Delight yourself in the LORD’ (whoever delights in
the knowledge of God).
All these criteria can only be fulfilled through faith in God and in his Son Jesus
Christ. And yet, alas, there are a good many Christians who are perfectly sincere in their belief,
and who nonetheless complain that they have repeatedly suffered painful experiences without
receiving any help from the Lord.
Just as we have to say to unbelievers that they must first come to faith in this God before they can
expect him to shield them from suffering, we must say both to unbelievers and to the Christians
mentioned above that the help of God is not a self-service store. If I want to buy a loaf of bread,
and just post myself in front of the counter without saying a word and wait, I may have to wait for
a long time. But this is just the kind of attitude that many Christians apparently think "prayer"
to consist in. They say nothing and do nothing, and then suppose that God will finally be obliged,
somehow, to intervene. It doesn’t work like that! Are we actually too proud to bring our requests
before God in prayer? Or do we imagine that God functions at the touch of a button?
As James, the eldest brother of the Lord, tells us in the passage below (Jam 4,1-3), it is often the
case that we do not have, because we do not ask.
You lust and do not have; you do not have because you do not ask.
Jam 4,1 What is the source of quarrels and conflicts among you? Is not
the source your pleasures that wage war in your members? 4,2 You lust and do not have; so you
commit murder. You are envious and cannot obtain; so you fight and quarrel. You do not have
because you do not ask; 4,3 You ask and do not receive, because you ask with wrong
motives, so that you may spend it on your pleasures. Jam 4, 1- 3;
But when we, as Christians, ask and do not obtain, we too must take these words as
being addressed to ourselves: "You ask and do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, so
that you may spend it on your pleasures."
The very first condition for God’s answering our prayers is – as I said earlier -
that a person should be a believer. And not one who believes in just any kind of God, as a visitor
to the website put it in a recent communication:
"please, i don’t want to go into detail about allah, god etc. – the
basic structure after all is the same ….. and that there are a whole load of deviations following
on that – well yes, without words as well."
In the Bible, the one and only God is presented to us in his threefold nature as
Father, Son and Holy Spirit, and it is to him that our prayers should be addressed. Nor is there
anything in the Bible about our addressing our prayers to a "Mary" or to any so-called "saints".
Any prayer which is not directly addressed to the God of the Bible or his Son Jesus Christ is being
sent to the wrong address, and is therefore idolatry.
What profit is the idol when its maker has carved it? Behold, it is overlaid with gold and silver, and there is no breath at all inside itm Inneren jeglicher Odem.
Hab 2,18 What profit is the idol when its maker has carved it, "Or
an image, a teacher of falsehood? For its maker trusts in his own handiwork when he fashions
speechless idols. 2,19 "Woe to him who says to a piece of wood, ‘Awake!’ To a mute
stone, ‘Arise!’ And that is your teacher? Behold, it is overlaid with gold and silver, And
there is no breath at all inside it.
2,20 "But the LORD is in His holy temple. Let all the earth be silent before Him."
Hab 2,18-20;
In Jesus Christ God has not only sent us his "Word" (Jn 1,1) – the Lord Jesus is
also the "ear" of God so to speak. He is the one and only mediator between God and humanity. Not
Mary, not Francis, not Benedict – or whatever other names may be given to the Catholic Church’s
idols of stone and wood. The same conclusion can be clearly drawn from the Lord’s saying in Jn
14,6.
No one comes to the Father but through Me.
Jn 14,6 Jesus said to him, "I am the way, and the truth, and the
life; no one comes to the Father but through Me. Jn 14, 6;
There is one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus.
1Tim 2,5 For there is one God, and one mediator also between God and men, the man Christ Jesus. 1Tim 2,5
A person who does not have Jesus as a mediator has no connection with God, and so
cannot expect that his prayers will be heard – or answered. In Jesus Christ God himself became man
and came to us. If we believe in him and pray to him, we are by that same token believing in and
praying to God himself.
He who has seen Me has seen the Father.
Jn 14,9 Jesus said to him, "Have I been so long with you, and yet
you have not come to know Me, Philip? He who has seen Me has seen the Father; how can you
say, ‘Show us the Father’? 14,10 "Do you not believe that I am in the Father, and the
Father is in Me? The words that I say to you I do not speak on My own initiative, but the Father
abiding in Me does His works. Jn 14, 9-10;
(See also Discourse 107: "The denial of the
Trinity, the false Catholic Trinity and the true biblical Trinity.")
Now as James says in the passage quoted earlier, not even the prayers of the
believing Christian will be heard by God when we "ask with wrong motives". Our requests, then,
cannot be either selfish or malicious. They must not harm anyone, nor may they bring us benefits we
have not deserved. And above all, they must be requests that come from the heart and that have
existential relevance either for us or for others.
But even if we meet these conditions, it is still by no means always the case that our requests will
be answered just in the way that we have imagined. The older brothers and sisters among us know from
their own lives that God often takes action long before we ask him to. This is also what is implied
when the Lord tells us in Mk 11,24: "believe that you have received them, and they shall be
granted you". This is how we recognize that our prayer has been answered. It is the Holy Spirit in
us that gives us the certainty that the things we have asked God for will also be granted us.
This is the case, whether it is a matter of the outcome of an operation (for our nearest and dearest
or for ourselves), the resolution of a family problem or professional difficulty or help in coping
with a financial emergency. If we have prayed about it, we know that we will receive what we ask for
- but it may be at a time and in a way that will not necessarily conform in detail to the way we
have imagined in putting our request. And yet we can be certain that it will come at the time and in
the way that is the most suitable in the light of our needs.
Another important condition for God’s answering our prayers is the way in which we present them.
And here the Lord has left us precise instructions:
Do not pray like the hypocrites in the synagogues (churches) so that they may be seen by men.
Mt 6,5 "When you pray, you are not to be like the hypocrites; for
they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and on the street corners so that they may be seen by
men. Truly I say to you, they have their reward in full.
6,6 "But you, when you pray, go into your inner room, close your door and pray to your
Father who is in secret, and your Father who sees what is done in secret will reward you. 6,7 "And
when you are praying, do not use meaningless repetition as the Gentiles do, for they suppose that
they will be heard for their many words. 6,8 "So do not be like them; for your Father knows
what you need before you ask Him. Mt 6, 5- 8;
As the Lord tells us here, we should not pray in public or in synagogues (churches)
where we can be seen by men. To begin with, in most cases this is only pleasing to our vanity, and
our prayer becomes a rhetorical and artificial exercise. This kind of exercise in prolixity receives
its reward from men and not from God.
But much more importantly, the Lord states here that we cannot have any effect at all by praying in
this public manner. Not even if we keep our prayers going – as happens in certain quarters – for
hours or whole nights at a time. Such prayers are ineffective, because God will not hear us in such
a place. God is not to be found in ecclesiastical buildings and in public places! Nor is God to be
looked for in the places where Christian congregations assemble. God does not have to be visited, he
is already present. He is in us, in our spirit, and we have the possibility open to us at all times
of speaking to him, if we turn to him in spirit in prayer. And this is much more likely to happen in
the seclusion of our inner room than in any place of assembly, wherever it may be. Gottfried
Daniel Pomacher, a revivalist preacher from Wuppertal, takes the same view of the matter:
"Christianity does not consist in words but rather in the power of the
Holy Spirit in the believer. The pillars of the temple are not those who attract the admiration of
their hearers with their public utterances of ‘Lord, Lord’, but rather those who – at home, in
the stillness of their own room, and without any audience – address their prayers to the Lord: these
are the ones who really support the congregation."
And here we must also point to a misunderstanding that has become prevalent
recently, especially in Catholic circles. We hear talk of "meditation" as that term is
understood in the Far East. This involves emptying the mind of all thoughts, and then maintaining
this state as long as possible, until some kind of "light" manifests itself (as a result of "sensory
deprivation").
This is not just wrong, it is positively dangerous! In Mt 12,43-45 the Lord warns us of what happens
when the spirit of a person is emptied.
When the u
nclean spirit finds the house unoccupied it goes in with seven
other spirits.
Mt 12,43 "Now when the unclean spirit goes out of a man, it passes
through waterless places seeking rest, and does not find it. 12,44 "Then it says, ‘I will
return to my house from which I came’ and when it comes, it finds it unoccupied, swept,
and put in order. 12,45 "Then it goes and takes along with it seven other spirits more
wicked than itself, and they go in and live there; and the last state of that man becomes worse than
the first. That is the way it will also be with this evil generation.". Mt 12,43-45;
The same kind of meditation technique is also practiced in the New Age movement, as
we learn in this extract from the article "Okkulte Praktiken" ["Occult Practices"] by Prof.
Reinhard Franzke:
"These trance techniques of the New Age movement are supposed to put
the individual into an altered state of consciousness – a quasi-hypnotic trancelike state. This is a
state that can be counted on to open the door to the worlds and powers of the Beyond. From a
Christian and Biblical point of view, this is always going to be the wrong door. If we try to open
this door by our own will and at the time chosen by ourselves, we will find the wrong entity on the
other side of the door: not the Lord, but the eternal Antagonist."
But not only in the New Age movement – even in Christian Charismatic Movements such
occult practices are more and more disseminated and pretended to be the "work of the Holy Spirit".
So if the Lord urges us in the passage quoted above (Mt 6,6) to go into our inner room when we want to pray, and to shut the door, he most certainly does not mean a form of meditation in which we just sit there with closed eyes and an empty head and wait for something to manifest. Quite to the contrary – we should fill our spirit with all the requests and all the gratitude with which our heart is charged, and our Father who is in secret is bound to hear and answer us.
This is because, as the Lord Jesus tells us in the passage below (Jn 4,23-24), our Father
in heaven is spirit and asks to be worshiped in spirit and truth.
God is spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.
Jn 4,23 "But an hour is coming, and now is, when the true
worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for such people the Father seeks to be His
worshipers. 4,24 "God is spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and
truth" . Jn 4,23-24;
Finally, it remains to consider those prayers of believing Christians which fulfill
all the conditions we have mentioned, but which all the same are not answered by God. We find an
example in Paul’s Second Epistle to the Corinthians:
Concerning this I implored the Lord three times.
2Cor 12,6 For if I do wish to boast I will not be foolish, for I will
be speaking the truth; but I refrain from this, so that no one will credit me with more than he sees
in me or hears from me. 12,7 Because of the surpassing greatness of the revelations, for this
reason, to keep me from exalting myself, there was given me a thorn in the flesh, a messenger of
Satan to torment me to keep me from exalting myself! 12,8 Concerning this I implored the Lord
three times that it might leave me. 12,9 And He has said to me, "My grace is sufficient
for you, for power is perfected in weakness." Most gladly, therefore, I will rather boast
about my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me. 2Cor 12; 6-9;
Here Paul writes that he was "given a thorn in the flesh". Of course it is not
possible for us today to determine what he meant by this, but it may be inferred from the context -
seeing that he speaks of the "flesh" – that it was some kind of physical handicap or troublesome illness. Paul himself knows well why he has to put up with this form of suffering – he had performed truly incredible feats in his proclamation of the Gospel, and had also received a great many revelations from the Lord. And as he himself writes, this entailed the risk – on the basis of his
personality, so it seems – that he might be tempted to "exalt himself" on that account – that he might become vain and arrogant on the strength of the special graces he had received. That is why the Lord gave him this "thorn in the flesh", as a reminder that he was guided and directed by the Lord and the Holy Spirit – so none of these achievements came by his own desert.
Now although Paul had "implored the Lord three times" that he should heal him of this infirmity,
the Lord did not answer his prayer. And moreover the Lord gave him to understand that he would have to continue to bear this cross. And as the Lord tells him that "My grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness", his suffering was clearly the lesser evil, by comparison with the risk of self-conceit which it served to prevent.
From this we can see that even many of our sufferings may be intended by God, as a means of restraining other propensities of our character or disposition. Let us not glorify, then, in our achievements, but in our weaknesses – putting our trust in the grace of the Lord in hope that in our weakness his power may be made perfect in us.
From what has been said so far, we learn that we as Christians have a responsibility for ourselves and for our neighbor (in the literal sense, those close to us), and should present our requests in prayer. This in no way justifies a form of prayer that focuses on "the world" – such as is favored in the Catholic church. Quite apart from the fact that such prayers are generally offered to the "Mother of God", and so are in any case sent to the wrong address, they cannot have any kind of effect either – as has been shown by the testimony of past centuries.
(See also Discourse 52: "Can the action of Mary be
effective in warding off the Bible’s prophecies of the Last Days?")
It would be presumption to pray to God for people we have not ever even spoken to. If we pray for "humanity", "the Third World", "the poor countries" and so on, we are not in a position to know how many criminals, unbelievers or atheists are to be found in the ranks of these people on whom we are asking God to confer his blessing.
But this is just the form of behavior we find in those nominal Christians who are unwilling to take the trouble to familiarize themselves with the problems of individual human beings, in order to make their lives and their needs part of their prayer. They want to put in as little effort as possible, while having the greatest possible effect on the world out there – pouring out as if from a watering can, to the benefit of an anonymous humanity, something that they are not in a position to dispose of: namely, the blessing of God. It is not individual human beings that they care about: the important thing for them is that the ceremony should be as impressive as possible – in optical and acoustic terms – for the outside observer. Here we find disputes about who, at the Mass, is permitted to say what and at what point, who is the first to be allowed to make his pronouncement in church and what the congregation is supposed to say in answer to it – and so on. We are familiar with this kind of things from the Catholic Mass – though that is not the only place where such attitudes are to be met with.
Apart from praying that they may be converted to the true faith, then, the Christian should not pray for people whom he has never seen or spoken with in person, and of whose detailed life circumstances he is therefore ignorant. If it is the will of God that prayers should be made on behalf of these people, he will put the matter into the heart of a believing Christian who lives in close contact with these individuals, and who is thus aware of what they are lacking, in spiritual and material terms, and what they truly need. But if these people are obdurate sinners, whom God has abandoned to their perverse ways, our superficial prayer on their behalf would put God’s justice in question, and the blame would fall on ourselves.
WBut neither should we as Christians (again with the exception of a prayer for conversion, when we have non-believers in mind) pray for people who make a deliberate point of rejecting us. This is because either the reason for their rejection of us is to be found in ourselves, in which case God will not hear our prayers until we have gone to them and sought reconciliation; or, on the other hand, the blame patently attaches to the other person, who for his part is not prepared to be reconciled with us. Then he, in his turn, is in a spiritual state where our prayers for him will not be able to help to any great extent, so we would do better to leave it to other brothers and sisters.
And finally we should reflect on the fact, too, that just as it is impossible for us to come to believe by proxy on another’s behalf – seeing that this decision can only be taken, in an absolutely personal way, in the life of the individual – so it is not possible to bring about the forgiveness of another’s sins either, however close to us the other person may be. The confession of sin and the request for forgiveness is a process that can only be performed by each individual before God, and obtained from God, in a totally personal way.
Our prayers, consequently, should focus on those people who are personally known to us, and of whose needs and concerns we are acquainted as a result of our exchanges with them, so that we are in a position to bring these before God in prayer. Anyone who follows this practice will undoubtedly have prayerful requests for which he needs half an hour’s time, or even longer, if he is to bring them before the Lord. And that, of course, on a daily basis – in the quiet of our inner room – and not just on Sunday, in the church or congregation.
And here we can make out a distinguishing feature of those of us who are truly concerned for their
brothers and sisters and pray for them to the Lord. Rather as a gardener will visit his plants,
after setting them in the earth, on a daily basis and will continue to monitor their development, so
as to see in good time if there is anything they need (more water, say, or protection from too
direct sunlight) and to give them what they require, so also the one who prays will be continuously
concerned with the people he prays for, both so as to learn how far the Lord has heard his prayers,
and also to find out if any additional considerations have entered the picture which must be
included as a new ingredient in his prayer.
So we should be able to see the difference between a person who – in the style so common today –
gives us a quick, "Hi, how are you doing?" and then flounces off, practically without waiting
for an answer, to get on with his own currently pressing concerns – and, on the other hand, one who
really enters into our situation and wants to find out whether and how we are coping with our
problems. Such a person could be one whose prayer to God on our behalf might really be effective.
One of the most touching arguments – one frequently brought up in connection with
the question "Why does God permit suffering?" – is this:
"We can understand that adults should suffer – but why should innocent
children who have done no harm to anybody have to die, and why does God allow this to happen?"
Here we must make a distinction between those children, first, who have died a
natural death – in consequence of a prenatal or postnatal disorder in the mother or child
(miscarriage, stillbirth, premature birth) or as a result of an illness in childhood – and, on the
other hand, all those who have been killed, whether in an accident, in war or for any other reason.
Now it sometimes proves to be the case that those women who throw this question into the discussion
with great vehemence have themselves aborted a pregnancy. Whether this amounts to the murder of a
child, and how long it takes from the moment of conception before it can be regarded as murder, is
still of course a highly controversial subject, and we will not go into it any further here.
But it is undeniable that the Catholic church is greatly to blame. It was the Catholic church which
condemned contraception, and forbade its members to use either condoms or (later on) the pill. We do
not find a single statement in the Bible in support of the view that sexual intercourse within
marriage is only permitted for the procreation of children. Quite to the contrary, the creation
itself makes use of a natural means of contraception, seeing that on days when the woman is
infertile it allows for sexual intercourse without conception.
So if in Catholic moral theology the intelligent exploitation of this natural period of infertility
(the Knaus – Ogino or rhythm method) is permitted, there are just no grounds whatever for the
condemnation of other intelligent and non – invasive methods of contraception. Above all at the
present time, when in wide areas of the world, especially in Africa, hundreds of children die every
day because Catholics (and also Moslems) ban the use of condoms on religious grounds, with the
result that these children are infected by the mother with AIDS from the moment of birth, this whole
issue becomes significant not just from the point of view of demographic planning but even more, and
increasingly, in terms of hygienic preventive medicine.
Nor can we allow the Catholic church any competence, any authority at all to pronounce on this
question. Quite apart from the fact that those of its representatives who call the tune deviate from
the Bible in inventing commandments at their human and arbitrary pleasure (papal infallibility, the
church as the only means of salvation, denial of wine to the faithful at the Lord’s Supper etc.),
in view of their own invented precept of priestly celibacy they cannot base their teaching on any
kind of experience of this often highly problematical area of human life. These Catholic
functionaries thus have neither the right nor the qualifications to lay down the law to the faithful
of their church in an area of life which they themselves have never experienced.
After centuries of secrecy and hushing up, the result of such otherworldly precepts can now no
longer be swept under the carpet. Having been forbidden to take wives, Catholic priests have been
getting off with men – and what is a whole lot worse, with children. In the US, a Catholic priest
was just recently condemned by a court of law (and this was a first), after he was proved to have
committed well over one hundred child abuse offenses. The Bishop who was his superior knew of his
doings for years, but repeatedly transferred the man to another parish, rather than casting him out
and calling him to account. On the other hand, outcast status is the fate reserved for those
individuals who cast doubt on the infallibility of the Pope, like the reputed Catholic theologian Hans
Küng.
And so it strikes us as a kind of paradox of history that it is precisely the Catholic church which
has finally now – thankfully – come out against homosexuality, while all other Christian churches
either draw a veil of silence over this area or even – like the evangelical churches – are prepared
to celebrate the "blessing" of homosexual unions.
Just like the unnatural precept of priestly celibacy, so too the condemnation of contraception puts
people into an agonizing dilemma of conscience. In extreme cases the first leads to child abuse, the
second to "infanticide" in the form of abortion (one thousand each workday only in Germany). And
even if abortion were to be judged as being not a case of infanticide, but just a minor surgical
intervention, these women in particular (of whom there are more and more all the time) quite simply
do not have any moral right to ask why God allows innocent children to perish.
Much rather should we ask, from a Christian view – what actually happens to these children when they
die? As Scripture makes no distinction from the rest of the human race in this respect, we must
assume that all human beings, whether children (of whatever age) or adults, will come to life again
in their spirit in the General Resurrection at the end of the world. In place of their corrupt
physical body they will receive a spiritual body and will appear at the Last Judgment. Those of the
dead who have already been raised to life in the Rapture are of course no longer included here.
See also Chapter 062: "The Return of the Lord – part 2: The
Rapture.")
At the Last Judgment, then, all these souls will be judged in accordance with their
actions during their earthly life – in accordance with their works, that is, as we are told in Rev
20,11 – 13:
The dead were judged from the things which were written in the books, according to their deeds.
Rev 20,11 Then I saw a great white throne and Him who sat upon
it, from whose presence earth and heaven fled away, and no place was found for them. 20,12 And I saw
the dead, the great and the small, standing before the throne, and books were opened; and
another book was opened, which is the book of life; and the dead were judged from the things
which were written in the books, according to their deeds. 20,13 And the sea gave up the dead
which were in it, and death and Hades gave up the dead which were in them; and they were judged,
every one of them according to their deeds. Rev 20,11-13;
On the day of the righteous judgment of God He will render to each person according to his deeds.
Rom 2,5 But because of your stubbornness and unrepentant heart you are
storing up wrath for yourself in the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God,
2,6 who will render to each person according to his deeds: 2,7 to those who by
perseverance in doing good seek for glory and honor and immortality, eternal life; 2,8 but to
those who are selfishly ambitious and do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness, wrath and
indignation. 2,9 There will be tribulation and distress for every soul of man who does evil, of
the Jew first and also of the Greek, 2,10 but glory and honor and peace to everyone who does good,
to the Jew first and also to the Greek. Rom 2, 5-10;
(See also Chapter 13: "The Last Judgment.")
These texts inform us that in the day of God’s judgment all human beings who in
their lifetime were selfishly ambitious, who did not obey the truth but obeyed unrighteousness and
did evil, will be condemned at God’s judgment seat to eternal damnation in accordance with their
works.
If we now apply these criteria to the children whose fate we are here trying to assess, we can see
that these innocent children cannot be charged with any of the crimes listed above. It follows from
this that all children who die here on earth – at any rate up to the age at which they would have
been capable of doing wrong deliberately – are saved, and will be given a "free pass" so to
speak that permits them to enter into God’s eternity. We have further confirmation of this from
Our Lord when he tell us, in Mt 19,14:
Do not hinder the children from coming to Me; for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these.
Mt 19,13 Then some children were brought to Him so that He might lay
His hands on them and pray; and the disciples rebuked them. 19,14 But Jesus said, "Let the
children alone, and do not hinder them from coming to Me; for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such
as these." 19,15 After laying His hands on them, He departed from there. Mt 19,13-15;
It must be said, however, that the fact that the murdered children will then, in the
General Resurrection, confront their murderers (whoever these may be) as adult human beings, will be
for the latter – if in the time that they were alive they did not take advantage of the redeeming
sacrifice of Our Lord for the forgiveness of their sins – the beginning of the weeping and gnashing
of teeth.
The angels will come forth and take out the wicked from among the righteous and will throw them into the furnace of fire.
Mt 13,47 "Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a dragnet cast into
the sea, and gathering fish of every kind; 13,48 and when it was filled, they drew it up on the
beach; and they sat down and gathered the good fish into containers, but the bad they threw away.
13,49 "So it will be at the end of the world; the angels will come forth and take out the
wicked from among the righteous, 13,50 and will throw them into the furnace of fire; in that
place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. 13,51 "Have you understood all these
things?" They said to Him, "Yes." 13,52 And Jesus said to them, "Therefore every
scribe who has become a disciple of the kingdom of heaven is like a head of a household, who brings
out of his treasure things new and old." Mt 13,47-52;
And so we might meet with the following scenario: a Christian mother loses her
daughter when still an infant to a childhood disease, and then brings up a son on good Christian
principles. The son subsequently turns away from his Christian belief. In the Resurrection, the
mother might then be separated from her son, while her daughter would be able to go with her hand in
hand into God’s eternity. So we can see that in the reality of God it is often the case that death
means life, and vice versa.
This applies, incidentally, in another respect as well. We formulated the question above – and it is
a question prompted by the love of children, and so by the love of humanity – "Why should innocent
children who have done no harm to anybody have to die, and why does God allow this to happen?" But
the question reveals the short – sightedness of the view to which it gives expression. Hitler and
Stalin too were once "innocent children who had done no harm to anybody" (as yet). But if
these two children had died in infancy, almost 70 million human beings would have lived out the
natural course of their lives. [1]
In connection with the argument quoted above about the "death of innocent children", we also
frequently come across people who say "I can’t believe in a God like that". This remark
insinuates that the speaker has had a great many thoughts about God, and after weighing the
arguments for and against has come to the final conclusion that he cannot believe in this kind of
God.
In fact, of course, in the great majority of cases the situation is quite different from this. It is
not a lack of ability that has made it impossible for these people to believe, but a lack of
volition. The speaker here has hardly taken serious thought about God in the whole of his life. His
life has always gone well up to now, and he never saw any necessity in the past of getting to grips
with these issues. And this business of the innocent children now comes along quite conveniently, as
it enables him to demonstrate to the outside world – and to himself, for that matter – first, that
God does not exist, and then that even if he does, this is a God who does not deserve to be believed
in. And with that he can comfortably settle back into his attitude of godless denial.
Pastor Wilhelm Busch takes a similar view in his book "Jesus, unser Schicksal" ["Jesus, our
Destiny"]. I would like in conclusion to quote a short extract from this – and I must say that I
would like very much to quote the entire book with all of its 237 pages, but I’m afraid I might
get into serious trouble with the publishing house if I did.
(…) The second group consists of those who say "I just can’t believe!",
but in reality, if they were completely honest, they would have to admit that what they really
mean is "I just don’t want to believe!" This is because if they were to come to believe
they would have to change their whole lives. And they wouldn’t like that. They know that
everything is wrong with their lives. If they were children of God, they would have to come into
the light. But no, they don’t want that. Besides, it might make them look silly in the eyes of
their colleagues. And what would their nearest and dearest say, if they suddenly became
Christians? No, definitely not! So if you come across people who say "I just can’t believe",
take a closer look, and see if they shouldn’t really have said "I just don’t want to
believe!"
There is a devastating story in the Bible. Here is the Son of God, the Lord Jesus, sitting on
the Mount of Olives. In the valley below him is the city of Jerusalem in glorious sunshine. Over
there the Mount of the Temple stands, with the glorious Temple built on it, of which even the
heathen said that it was an edifice that really had to be counted among the wonders of the
world. All this is outspread below him. But all of a sudden, the disciples see to their horror
that tears are running down his cheeks. They turn to him in surprise and puzzlement. And then
these words break from the Lord Jesus: "O Jerusalem, Jerusalem… how often I wanted to gather
your children together, the way a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were
unwilling. Now you are confronted with the judgment of God. Behold, your house is being left to
you desolate!" (a free quotation from Mt 23,37-38). This is one of the most devastating
sayings in the Bible: "But you were unwilling". The people of Jerusalem also doubtless said,
"We just cannot believe" – but actually they did not want to.
Look – if you don’t want to believe, you really don’t have to! Can I tell you something? In
the church there are still all kinds of compulsions enforced. In the Kingdom of God, there is
only an absolute freedom of the will. If you want to live without God, you can do it! God offers
himself to us. But we can refuse him. Do you want to live without God? You may. Do you want to
live without having made your peace with God? You may. Do you want to live without prayer? You
may. Do you want to live without the Bible? You may. Do you want to transgress God’s
commandments? You may. Do you want to profane the Lord’s Day, be sexually promiscuous, drink,
lie and steal? You may. Anyone who does not want this Savior whom God has sent to save sinners
is at liberty to turn him down. Anyone who wants to go to hell can do just that.
With God there are no compulsions. But please be clear on one point – you will have to live with the
consequences. In Jesus God offers you peace, and the forgiveness of your sins. You can say, "I
don’t need it! And I don’t want it either!" And you may live accordingly. But then you are
not to suppose that in the last five minutes of your life, when you are on the point of death,
you will still be able to grasp what God has been offering to you for the length of a whole
lifetime. You are free to reject God’s offer of peace in Christ Jesus, but then you must live
for all eternity without having made your peace with God. And that is hell.
Hell is the place where you have finally and truly succeeded in getting rid of God. You are no
longer invited. There is nothing calling you any longer. Perhaps you may want to pray, but you
can’t do it any more. Perhaps you may want to call on the name of Jesus, but you can’t
remember it any longer. You don’t need to accept this message I have for you. You can forget
about converting to belief in Jesus, if that is what you want. But be clear about what you are
doing, because you are choosing hell – and you have absolute freedom to do so!
"But you were unwilling!" Jesus tells the people of Jerusalem. He did not compel them in any
way. But what they chose was horrible!
Wilhelm Busch (1897‒1966) was a Pastor and youth worker in Essen, an evangelist,
preacher, writer and author.
+) This extract and the photo are taken from the book "Jesus unser Schicksal" ["Jesus our
Destiny"], by W. Busch, Schriftenmissions‒Verlag Gladbeck/Westfalen [Scriptural Mission
Publications, Gladbeck/Westphalia], ISBN 3-7958-0364-0.
(See also the Discourse 24:"The divinity of Jesus
Christ and the power of faith.")
Rabbi Chaim ChofetzA visitor came to Rabbi Chaim Chofetz one day to ask his advice. When the man saw that the rabbi’s apartment
consisted of a tiny room with only a couch, a table with a chair and a row of books, he asked the rabbi in amazement, "Master, where do you have your furniture and household goods?" --- o --- If someone had asked Rabbi Chofetz back then why God allows innocent little children to die from disease, hunger
or war, he would surely have said: "Don't worry, you'll see them again. We are all just passing through!" Is Pope Francis hiding the cross from the chief rabbis? Mt 10,32 "Whoever therefore confesses me before men, him I will also confess before my heavenly
Father. |
I am essentially in agreement with your arguments about the Catholic church. But
then when you give your support to contraception, my sympathy for your position flies out the
window again.
You do not seem to have considered that the pill – even if it is a "non‒invasive intervention",
as you put it – still uses chemical means to alter certain physical functions of the female
organism, and therefore is just as "invasive" and so (as Catholic moral theology rightly
says) should be rejected from a religious point of view.
Benedikt Kromlechner B.Kromlechner@aol.com
Earlier on, on the first pages of this Discourse 55 on the subject "Why
does God permit suffering?", I expressed the view that banning Catholic Christian
believers from using contraceptive methods based on condoms or the pill and so on is
incomprehensible, seeing that Catholic moral theology admits the Knaus‒Ogino or rhythm method, and
thus there can be no valid argument against other non‒invasive methods – like condoms and the pill.
Above all at the present time, when in wide areas of the world, especially in Africa, hundreds of
children die every day because Catholics (and also Moslems) ban the use of condoms on religious
grounds, with the result that these children are infected by the mother with AIDS from the moment of
birth, this whole issue becomes significant not just from the point of view of demographic planning
but even more, and increasingly, in terms of hygienic preventive medicine.
As the author of the comment quoted above quite correctly says, taking the pill has an effect on
certain physical functions of the female organism.
After ovulation, at the start of a woman’s fertile period, the hormone progesterone is
produced by the ovaries. The presence of this hormone prevents the coming to maturity of further egg
cells (which might result in double fertilization or dizygotic twins), as well as blocking further
ovulation. If the egg has not been fertilized, after 28 days of the cycle it will be discharged in
the woman’s monthly courses, along with the endometrium. The ingredient the pill contains, gestagen
– a synthetically produced and better tolerated hormone substitute for the naturally generated progesterone
– has just the same effect as the latter: only its presence has the effect of preventing ovulation
in the first instance. As now no mature egg is present, and further ovulation is likewise ruled out,
fertilization is unable to take place.
This method, then, can in no way be described as an "invasive intervention" – a term that can be
applied only to surgical or to other (minimally invasive) forms of treatment, like acupuncture for
instance. If we use this principle to justify our banning this method of contraception, in all
consistency we would also have to reject all other forms of pharmaceutical treatment, as in cases of
headache, acid stomach and so on, on religious grounds.
Turning the matter about, the question suggests itself whether Catholic moral theology has given the
right amount of thought to these issues, or whether – as with priestly celibacy, the denial of
communion wine to the people of God at the Lord’s Supper or the ban on women’s holding
consecrated functions in the church – we have here a case of authoritarian and ivory – towered
decisions made in the board room, without any real understanding of or reference to reality.
As a Christian whose faith is in the Bible, too – and for that very reason – I can only react with
astonishment and incomprehension to these words of Cardinal Meissner of Cologne:
"The ordination of women is just as much of an absurdity as if men
wanted to give birth to children."
On the contrary, we read of Our Lord Jesus Christ (in Jn 12,1-3) the following:
Mary then took a pound of very costly perfume of pure nard, and anointed the
feet of Jesus and wiped His feet with her hair.
Jn 12,1 Jesus, therefore, six days before the Passover, came to Bethany
where Lazarus was, whom Jesus had raised from the dead. 12,2 So they made Him a supper there, and
Martha was serving; but Lazarus was one of those reclining at the table with Him. 12,3 Mary
then took a pound of very costly perfume of pure nard, and anointed the feet of Jesus and wiped His
feet with her hair; and the house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume. Jn 12, 1- 3;
So if Our Lord and God let his feet be anointed by a woman, and then dried with her
hair, even the Pope in Rome – let alone the Cardinal of Cologne – is not in a position to cast
aspersions on the service of women done to Our Lord and to the people of God.
But it is possible that the Cardinal’s statement has quite a different background.
In 1995 the Austrian Cardinal Hans Hermann Groer was accused, by one of his former charges, of
having subjected him and other boys to sexual abuse for years. Groer apologized and resigned his
office. At Groer’s funeral Cardinal Meissner of Cologne gave an address, in which he announced:
"Cardinal Groer was privileged to follow the Lord on the Way of the Cross, like Simon of Cyrene."
Quite apart from the fact that the Lord would not have allowed any sexual abuser or pederast to
follow him on the way of the cross, this comparison – rather like the one quoted earlier with
reference to "men’s wanting to be able to have children" – is so extraordinarily tasteless as
to leave us with the impression that the Cardinal must suffer from a complete moral and ethical
deficiency.
(See also Discourse 59: "What does Scripture
really say about the position of a woman in Church?")
I do not think it makes sense for anyone to take the pill at all, let alone over
a period of 25‒30 years. I think it is very invasive. In my view we need to make a start with
giving children and young people all over the world timely advice on how to manage their own
sexuality. I find it unbelievable that when people have to learn to eat properly and to go to
the bathroom, they take so little time and trouble to tell their children about responsible
sexual practices and about sexual abuse, about restraint and sublimation. And one aspect of this
is that sexuality should only be exercised in the protected space of a divinely willed marriage.
I think that the pill is not just damaging to health, it has also – when taken by very young
people, and with schoolgirls being prescribed the pill by those who have the nerve to call
themselves doctors – done a great deal to contribute to the loose sexual morality that we see
today. What is more, while it may "protect" women from having a baby it certainly will not
protect them from AIDS.
Helga Maria Vinagreiro HelgaVinagreiro@tele2.at
I am of course completely in agreement with most of the arguments advanced in the
above reply. It is not my main concern here, either, to defend the pill as such, but rather to point
to the hypocritical arguments of Catholic moral theology. According to the most recent figures there
are more than a billion Catholics in the world. And now a handful of men in Catholic holy orders,
who in view of their "articles of association" are only able to know anything about sexuality on
the basis of hearsay, have the effrontery to lay down the law for a billion people in matters
touching this most intimate area of experience. This manner of proceeding could be justified if we
had any kind of indication that contraception is prohibited by Scripture as such. But on the
contrary, we find a case of coitus interruptus mentioned in the Bible, and then there is the
natural phenomenon of the woman’s infertile period, which by the will of God makes sexual
intercourse possible without conception (Knaus‒Ogino method).
As for the claim that the pill is a "highly invasive" form of medication, let me state here once
more that "invasive" in this context is a specialist term, and denotes a medical intervention, a
treatment or examination that involves damage to the surface of the body, internally or externally.
So for example ultrasound is a non‒invasive investigative method; investigation using a cardiac
catheter, on the other hand, is invasive. An operation that involves opening up the rib cage is
invasive; acupuncture is a minimally invasive form of intervention. Among contraceptive measures,
the various options based on a mechanical barrier, or for that matter the pill, are to be classed as
non‒invasive methods, whereas sterilization and the closing of the womb (by sewing it shut) are
invasive interventions.
The statement made in the above comment that "while [the pill] may ‘protect’ women from having
a baby it certainly will not protect them from Aids" is a way of thinking that falls a little bit
short. Of course use of the pill in sexual intercourse is not going to provide any protection
against AIDS. And yet every year – as mentioned earlier – there are millions of children born all
over the world who at the time of their birth are already infected with AIDS through the blood of
their mothers. It is perfectly obvious that these millions of innocent children suffering from AIDS
could have been prevented by the use of the pill.
The rest of the above argument we can assent to without any kind of reserve – most particularly when
it comes to the remark that here it is the parents who are called on to meet their obligations and
teach their children how to manage their sexuality responsibly. Though this is a crying need, it is
one that is voiced all too little today. Of course it depends on the parents actually knowing
themselves how to deal with sex in a responsible manner. And this is a condition which is
unfortunately less and less frequently met in the families of today.
o People murdered by Stalin and Hitler:
In the years 1932/33, acting for political reasons, Stalin cut off his fellow countrymen in the
Ukraine from any supply of provisions, and set a military watch over the whole country to make it
impossible for them to escape. Altogether at that time
– 7 million Ukrainians perished miserably by starvation in their own country.
In the Second World War, started by Hitler with the attack on Poland in 1939, altogether
– 25 million soldiers and
– 30 million civilians, from all the 61 nations that took part, lost their lives.
Of those whom the Nazis, starting in 1941, deported to concentration camps,
– 6 million Jews, and other internees, were killed.
That is without referring to the millions of people for whose deaths the third mass murderer of the
twentieth century, Mao Tse Tung, was responsible.