Video Meliora, proboque; Deteriora sequor

A Plan B World?

An Orthodox theologian has a book out on the tsunami:

...to the claim that the tsunami provides evidence against the existence of a benevolent and omnipotent God Mr. Hart responds: The disordered world in which we live isn't as God intended and created it. God did order the world in such a way that natural disasters don't happen.

Explanations for why it's a Plan B world are less impressive than the fact that God Himself lived, suffered and died in this Plan B world.

I used to think we were owed an explanation for the world as we find it but have gotten a bit more comfortable with the symmetry between the individual and the world: the individual remembers not his birth and knows not where he is going and the human race as a whole remembers not its birth and knows not where it is going (except in very broad strokes).

A few years ago I sent a few emails to Richard Geraghty (Phd in Philosophy, of EWTN's Q & A forum) to try to get him to admit that this isn't the intended world; my efforts were without success. He wrote:

I do not think that the sin of Adam and Eve affected the physical laws of the universe. Why should it? The sin was performed by two creatures who, having free will, were capable of sinning. The things of nature are not capable of sinning because they do not have free will. Nor is nature sinning or being defective in any way when lions eat lambs or micorbes destroy each other...I would not see nature as an evil or cursed thing; rather I would see it as a servant of God doing what it has always done. And what it has done to to reward the man who treats it respectfully and stomp on the man who treats it without respect.

[And then in response to a follow-up question:]

I have difficulty with the notion that nature itself is cruel and inhuman. Scripture has it that the world was made for man. When man was good, he was in tune with this world. When man fell, he tried to abuse nature just as he abused himself. In this case, nature can then turn into God's instrument for justice.

UPDATE: Amy posted something that looks interesting.