My Barefoot Theology

People often say that God will not give you a cross that you cannot bear. And people have often asked why God allows bad things to happen to good people.

I believe in an all loving God who is all good. So nothing bad can come from Him - not the cross that people say is meant to strengthen our faith, not the problems that people say are God's teaching moments, not the sickness that people say He sends to test our fidelity. Bad things happen because we make wrong decisions, other people make wrong decisions which affect us, and nature follows its laws.

So do I believe in a passive God? I don't. I believe He intervenes when He thinks it's right for us just as He does not intervene if it's for our good. But such interventions are rare and only for the good. My favorite image of our relationship with God was given to me by our parish priest in Silver Spring, MD. He depicted this relationship as two spiders spinning a web. When we spin in one direction which God thinks is not the right direction, he spins us to the right direction. If we again spin wrongly, he spins back. The web could get very intricate if we keep spinning in the wrong direction. Hopefully, in time, the outer part of the web will become less intricate as we discern God's will through constant prayer and communion with him.