Natural disasters. As in, earthquakes, tsunamis, volcanic eruptions, tornadoes, hurricanes, etc., etc. When the initial time spent telling the horror stories is over, we enter the phase where we more rationally(?) look for who to blame. Not unsurprisingly ‘god’ has his head on the chopping block on this one.
It’s interesting watching religious leaders and their various takes on it. On the one extreme you have them saying that it makes them question their own belief in a god, and on the other extreme you have those who are quite happy that it was all a punishment for being evil and nasty human beings breaking some of rules. Quite what the babies and toddlers who are crushed or swept to a most horrifying death were being punished for having done I don’t quite get, but then I exist outside of the need to look to a god to help brush stuff I don’t understand under the carpet.
Believers will of course say that I am blind because I cannot see the god that is so clearly all around us (he’s bouncing up and down on a pogo stick right in front of you as we speak, and he’s about to spray you with spray string, not that you’d notice) yet there are some obvious theological explanations for the earthquake and tsunami that they will simply not consider (because they just don’t want to):
1. God is an utter bastard. He did it all right, because he’s horrible.
2. God is impotent (maybe that whole omnipotence thing was a typo). He didn’t do it, but neither was he able to stop it. Sure, he designed the universe, but he did a bloody awful bodge job of it and has since washed his hands of the whole project.
3. God couldn’t give a fuck about any of us, especially anyone in or near the Indian Ocean (and Mexico, Krakatoa, Pompeii, Mount St. Helens, etc…). He didn’t cause the disaster, but he couldn’t be arsed to stop it. Or even to telephone Sri Lanka with a three hour warning. Bastard, eh?
4. God doesn’t exist. The earthquake was merely a seismological thing and the reason nobody/nothing stopped it is that there is nobody/nothing clever enough/in place to properly predict it, let alone prevent it.
I only hope the whole series of events will make the god-botherers turn from blind unquestioning faith and look at the reality. Will they? Nargh.
England's England 