The Existence of God 3

Many have argued that the existence of an all-powerful, all knowing and all loving God is impossible because of the existence of evil and suffering in the world. The argument goes something like this: If God were all-powerful, all knowing, and all loving, He wouldn’t allow evil and suffering to exist. The fact that it does exist means one of three things: either God is unaware of it (in which case He’s not all knowing), He’s unable to prevent it (in which case He’s not all powerful), or He simply chooses not to prevent it (in which case He’s not all loving).

This argument is clever, but ultimately it proves nothing. The reason it proves nothing is that it presupposes that evil and suffering in the world serve no purpose. But why should we assume that? The other problem with the argument is this: in saying that God’s allowance for suffering is pointless, one assumes that if God did have a purpose for allowing suffering we would be able to see that purpose, and since we don’t see it, there must not be one. But this, of course, assumes that we are just as omniscient as God!