For anyone who has read either of St. Thomas Aquinas’ Summas, it is patently obvious that he took objections to the Catholic Faith seriously. Put more precisely, he felt obligated to address serious objections fully. So keen was his understanding that he often made his opponents’ arguments more precisely and succinctly than they can. One can often learn more from the objections and their responses than from the substance of his response. Christians of today could learn much from the Angelic Doctor in this regard, especially when it comes to the existence of God. There are most certainly motives of credibility that honest atheists must take seriously if they are genuinely interested in discovering the truth. But these can often be overshadowed by what might be called “a motive of discredibility”, namely the problem of evil and suffering, that Christians must also take seriously.
When St. Thomas tackles the existence of God in the Summa Theologiae, he finds this to be the only real objection. This was not to suggest that other objections don’t matter, but that they begin to fade away once this objection has received a sufficient answer. St. Thomas articulates the objection like this: “It seems that God does not exist; because if one of two contraries be infinite, the other would be altogether destroyed. But the word ‘God’ means that He is infinite goodness. If, therefore, God existed, there would be no evil discoverable; but there is evil in the world. Therefore God does not exist” (ST I, q.2 art 3, obj. 1).
The Dilemma of Suffering and Evil
Notice that the objector has set up what is essentially a dilemma revolving around God’s infinite goodness. If God is omnibenevolent then evil cannot exist. Many have added to this argument by suggesting that the problem is really a tri-lemma in that God could not be infinitely wise, good and powerful if evil exists. Either he cannot stop the evil (omnipotence), wills the evil (omnibenevolence) or doesn’t know how to stop it (omnisapience).
St. Thomas, in a certain sense, anticipates the expanded objection when he quotes St. Augustine who said “Since God is the highest good, He would not allow any evil to exist in His works, unless His omnipotence and goodness were such as to bring good even out of evil” and adds his own comment that, “This is part of the infinite goodness of God, that He should allow evil to exist, and out of it produce good” (ST I, q.2 art 3, ad. 1).
What St. Thomas doesn’t say, but that remains just beneath the surface of what he did, is that evil, once properly framed, actually presents an argument for God. Evil in the metaphysical sense does not exist. This does not mean it is not a reality or that it causes suffering in people, but this suffering is not a result of the evil per se, but of the deprivation of a good that should otherwise be there. Blindness is a deprivation of the good of sight and therefore is an evil. Moral evils like sins and vices are nothing but a lack of the moral good that should otherwise be in and flow from the human heart.
This distinction, although well known, is important for two reasons. First, it refutes any dualistic ontological explanations. Second, and more closely related to our point, is the fact that when good comes from evil, it is always a creation ex nihilio. Good that does come comes from absolutely nothing. Only a being Who is all powerful can create out of nothing so that the problem of evil presents no difficulty to the principle of God’s omnipotence. In fact, a God who allows evil and suffering and brings good out of it is more powerful than a God who simply erects a divine Stop Sign to stamp out any evil beforehand.
Neither does evil or suffering present a difficulty to God’s omnibenevolence. Especially when we add the principle that God only allows evil to occur when it is the only manner in which a particular good can come about. Certain goods such as self-sacrifice can only exist in a world in which evil and suffering are possible. One could see that the world with evil and suffering in it actually manifests God’s goodness more than a world without it (if it didn’t He wouldn’t have allowed it that way).
Christ Crucified and God’s Wisdom
Once we grasp the preceding two points we see that only a God Who is all-wise could navigate these waters. And this is why it is Wisdom Incarnate Who ultimately “dwelt among us” in order to prove this point. When Christ healed the man born blind, the disciples ask Him what the man (or his parents) did wrong to deserve this. He tells them that his blindness and his healing was so that God’s goodness could be made manifest. Christ did not alleviate the suffering of everyone He met. He did not heal those who deserved it either. He healed only those, like the man born blind, that would glorify God and be better off without it. There were many people He didn’t heal, but that wasn’t because He didn’t have time or didn’t care. He was consistently applying His principle. Those who were left to suffer were glorifying God in their suffering and were better off because of it.
Those who suffer know that the problem of evil is no mere intellectual problem. But the Christian must proclaim that there is no mere intellectual solution. The answer to evil and suffering is not a philosophical proof but Christ crucified. Christ is the final answer to this problem, because in truth, only by way of participation in His Cross is God’s goodness made manifest to the individual person. Through suffering and evil God brings the greatest Good, Himself. Suffering becomes a treasure that never ceases to give a return on investment. Rather than an obstacle it becomes a launching pad. Christians who grasp this and live it out become the most effective argument against those who have yet to see it.