A Theodicy

{answering the question of “How can such evil and suffering exist in a world created and sustained by a good and loving God?”}

“I think this is a very childish conception of God. God is somebody who is in front of us very weak. He loves us. The more you love somebody the more you can be hurt by this person… because you can be hurt by her and you don’t want to force her to become something—you want her to do it from her own willingness. That is the attitude of God with us and we have the proof of that for us who are Christian in the way he has sent his son to save us. He did not send a strong man or legions of angels and so on, he sent somebody who said to us: ‘ you have the potential to save the world but I am not going to force you, it is up  to you to decide’. God is a mystery but he can be discovered only through the weak and fragile part of us and around us. And then we discover that this is the power of the transformation of the world—not through armies or something like that.”

—Xavier Le Pichon

Please listen to “Xavier le Pichon—The Fragility at the Heart of Humanity”