The scientific problems with atheism continue to mount while theism’s explanatory power becomes stronger. Many theistic apologists (those defending faith in a God) now feel that the problem of evil, not alternative scientific explanations, poses the greatest obstacle to a defense of faith in God.

I think they are correct: the fact that the universe has an unexplained origin (and we have no proof that anything eternally preceded it), the unbelievable fine-tuning of the initial conditions of the universe and of the constants that determine the laws of physics, and the otherwise unexplainable origin of life (which has become evermore elusive the more we learn about the complexity of life) are increasingly large problems for atheism. The only satisfactory answer is that there are infinite universes – and yet there is no evidence that there are infinite universes, and even infinite universes would require an infinite universe-creating mechanism, which itself would require fine-tuning that would still lack an explanation. And does anyone actually believe in infinite universes? If you don’t believe in God, then you should certainly believe as fervently in infinite universes (even though you have no proof for them) as theists believe in God, because that is the only other plausible explanation – and it’s still not a very good one.

So atheistic belief is in real jeopardy from the scientific breakthroughs about the origin of the universe, the fine-tuning of the universe, and the origin of life.

What Remains

What remains – and what most new, new atheists (like Alex O’Connor) have latched onto – is how the problem of evil is an obstacle to faith. (And, for the sake of completeness, Alex O’Connor would also cite the problem of divine hiddenness, though I will not cover that today except to say now that I do not find this idea particularly problematic.)

The problem of evil, which has been heavily debated and appears no closer to a solution, is thus:

·       God is perfectly good.

·       God is all-knowing.

·       God is all-powerful.

·       Evil exists.

As the logical argument goes, all four cannot be correct.

And there is real force behind that assertion. While we all know that pain and suffering can push us to become better and stronger (so we can see a purpose behind some amount of pain and suffering, as we can see perhaps most evidently when raising a child, for instance), there is no fully satisfying explanation for gratuitous suffering (suffering that greatly appears to have no purpose). Think of the worst things you can (a child abducted by a molester who tortures and eventually kills the child), and you get the idea. No one can give a satisfactory answer to how such depravity could serve any good or useful purpose.

There are some logical arguments that one could still make (such that God places such a premium on human freedom that even this degree of evil is required in order to allow for maximum freedom. Yet none of these logical arguments will satisfy the ache in the human heart at such unimaginable pain and suffering for which we see no purpose at all.

In my own life, the problem of evil has been the greatest stumbling block that I have had to belief and trust in God (and I wrote a blog post over 2 years ago on the problem of evil, which I had been trying to work past for years).

The Atheistic Alternative

However, for me, personally, the problem of evil no longer poses an obstacle to my belief in God. Or at least the obstacle is now greatly diminished: before global media, we saw and heard only about the pain and suffering of those around us. Now that the greatest pain and suffering in the world gets shared to the world, I think our awareness of pain and suffering is much greater than ever before (in terms of humanity’s constant awareness and even focus on it). And so the problem of evil is then a greater obstacle to faith as well because of our heightened awareness of just how much pain and suffering is happening around the world.

The reason the problem of evil no longer poses such an obstacle, however, is that atheism doesn’t solve the problem. Atheists point out the problem of evil and give the solution that because evil exists, God does not. And yet, if God doesn’t exist, evil also doesn’t exist – this is widely acknowledged among atheists in the most elite circles. Sure, humanity can still have social contracts dictating right and wrong, and humans still have a moral compass, but neither of those things makes actions actually right or wrong. It only makes them socially right and wrong, and necessitates that nothing is objectively right or wrong.

Richard Dawkins famously stated that there is “no design, no purpose, no evil, no good, nothing but pitiless indifference.” For atheists (those who really know the implications of their belief that there is no God), there is no right and wrong, and the reason is quite simple: we are just atoms like any other atoms. There is no difference between the atoms of a rock and the atoms of a human. Both a rock and a human are aggregations of atoms. If a rock or a human is cast off the top of a mountain and breaks apart on the ground, it makes no difference. It is a big aggregation of atoms breaking into smaller aggregations of atoms, which will become absorbed into other aggregations of atoms, and so on.

Furthermore, there is no free will because, just like a bacterium operates as a small biological robot, we are just a larger biological robot. We believe we have free will and consciousness, but free will is impossible according to atheistic naturalism: like a speck of dust carried by the wind, we tumble through life thinking we’re making decisions, but all of our seeming decisions were pre-wired, and we simply responded according to our wiring and our circumstances. We had no more control over our direction and outcome than the speck of dust did. (See the footnote at the bottom of the page for more explanation for why free will is incompatible with secular science.)

And, clearly, if there is no free will, there is no morality because people have no ability to choose what is right and wrong (everything is determined by our pre-programmed way to respond to stimuli).

But this view that there is nothing of value in humanity, no design, no purpose, no free will, and no morality poses a huge problem. The problem is that no one actually thinks that or lives that way.

The Reality of How People Think and Live

When people say that there is no purpose to life, that humans have no more value than any other atoms, that there is no free will, and/or that there is no morality, they all live as if those things aren’t true. If someone lives as if those things aren’t true, we can’t justifiably say that the person believes they are true. If they’re not true (for instance, no right or wrong exists), live that way. (But, also, please don’t, because you’ll make the world worse for the rest of us – but, also, you shouldn’t care about that.) Granted, I’m glad people who say they don’t believe in morality (but steal something from them, and they will become a believer that they were wronged real quick) still typically follow moral behavior. We are all hypocrites to one degree or another, and atheist hypocrisy helps everyone else.

Which brings me back to the problem of evil. Atheism offers no solution. Its solution to the problem of evil is that God doesn’t exist – and thus that evil, too, doesn’t exist. So to disprove God, atheists had to assert that the premise that they used to disprove God (that evil exists) isn’t even a real premise at all. And, more so, they then introduce more problems: no free will, no morality, and no true purpose to life. But they all believe (as their actions prove) that these things exist. And I think that’s the right thing to do. Not everything can be proven by the scientific method, and yet we believe – based on our own experience – that love is real, we have free will, there is good and evil, and humans and their lives have meaning and purpose.

Because atheism offers no solution, we come back to God. Can there be any way that an all-good, all-powerful, and all-knowing God exists even when evil exists? Evidently, yes. We don’t have the answer, but as created beings, it’s very conceivable that there is an answer that we can’t comprehend. That doesn’t give us the answer, but at least it points us to the fact that one can exist.

An Example

Here’s an example. Would all the suffering of every person throughout all of human history be worth it if it saved the immortal soul of one being? Even when you imagine the worst evils, the answer is actually still “yes.” The reason is fairly obvious: all the pain and suffering from all humans for all of history is still a finite amount of suffering. The damnation of an immortal soul would result in infinite suffering. So any finite amount of suffering – no matter how great – would ultimately end up being infinitely less than infinite suffering because the infinite suffering would have no end, ever.

Atheists will probably find the following unconvincing (because it requires faith), but imagine that God is real and the Devil is real. The Devil rebelled and continues to rebel against God. God aims to prove to the Devil that goodness and love are stronger than evil, and so He agrees to let the Devil rule over a world predicated on the survival of the fittest in order to show the Devil that unimaginable good will prevail even under a system designed to literally kill off the weak. Humanity, for all its flaws, shows that incredible goodness is possible even in such a world. God’s work in the world is not finished, but it is working. Ask almost anyone if they would rather be born now or be born 100, 500, 1000, 5000, or 20,000 years ago, and they will say they are glad to have been born now. Evil is, slowly and in ebbs and flows, in retreat. God will prevail. Goodness will prevail. And, maybe, just maybe, the Devil’s soul will finally surrender again to God’s mercy and grace when he sees that all the pain and suffering thrown at humanity could not conquer goodness and love. Would it be worth it? Personally, I would feel better knowing that my own pain and suffering was contributing to the saving of another being’s immortal soul.

Now, I don’t necessarily believe the latter – quite frankly, it’s borderline or beyond borderline heretical. But it demonstrates that there could be so much more working beyond the scope of our comprehension that would otherwise explain the gratuitous pain and suffering that we either experience or at least are aware of.

Goodness

Most importantly, for me at least but I think for other people who believe in God, I know God is good. When I’m on my knees, I feel God’s love, mercy, and grace. I see Him working in my life, making me a better person, and working in my family’s life. As much as I can, I surrender to God’s providential design. I trust that He is good and His purposes are for the good of His creation.

It is on the cross, dying for the sins of His fallen creation, that God most starkly proves His love for us. When I doubt, I turn to the cross, and I see love beyond comprehension.

Perhaps that will not satisfy you. Perhaps nothing will. Life will still have pain and suffering, but, for me, I am struck with the heartache of how loved I feel when I submit to God, so much so that the theoretical problem posed by the problem of evil disappears when confronted with the reality of the love that I experience from God.

More on free will: For there to be free will, there have to be outputs/outcomes that can’t be explained by all inputs (genes, experiences, and circumstances). For there to be different outputs than are explainable by all material inputs, there has to be some immaterial explanation. (I am ignoring quantum mechanics for now, even though it does give indeterminate outcomes, because people still don’t have control over those indeterminate outcomes.) Thus, in order for there to be free will, there has to be something else, something immaterial for which secular science has no explanation and, in fact, for which science would say is impossible (because secular science doesn’t consider anything beyond the material as possible). Jerry Coyne, a former evolutionary biology professor at the University of Chicago, gives a good, concise explanation of how free will is incompatible with science (he’s an atheist who theoretically — because I’m sure he acts as if free will exists — believes that free will does not exist).