If there is a God, then why do so many bad things happen in the world?

If there was ever a question of all questions, this would be very high ranking on the list if you ask me.
And it's not just a question to answer with a one liner taken from a door-to-door Jesus sales guy's script either.
I'm pretty sure that many devout believers will have an answer to this question, but I am almost as sure that these same people had doubts about it somewhere down the line as well.
So to get to the bottom of this, in my opinion, we have to ask ourselves more than just this one question.

source: jw.org

Who is God?

If we're looking at it from the point of view mentioned in all the different versions of the bible, or most other holy books, God is either the holy trinity in mainstream Christianity, the Light (whatever that means) in some, the Lord or King in others (couldn't get more patriarchal than that) with names like Elohim, El-Shaddai, Yahweh, Jehovah and Adonai in Hebrew or Allah in Islam. I've always believed that whatever the name or religion, they really mean one and the same 'guy' - even though a lot of these religions don't get along and each believe that their God is the only right god. I think you have to be an outsider to see it for what it is. Or what it isn't.

An entity that created the heavens and the earth and all life on it... The creator. Omnipotent.
Somehow I've always thought there was something missing. Because 'he' created the heavens...But what is meant by that?
Did he create the universe as well? Or just our part of it? That is something that someone yet has to explain to me as the books written about the subject aren't very clear.

Now, on the other hand, we have a full-on New Age movement who believe that there is a creator, but that this lives inside of all of us and not somewhere in the sky. Some will even go as far as to say that we are ALL gods in our own right and that we control the fate of the earth and all its inhabitants.

And there are many, MANY other ways of thinking when it comes to who leads this business we call life.

But maybe, besides asking who god is, we may want to ask where the hell he came from. Did he just appear one day and made the world, or was he hanging around for some time, seen the world go to pieces so he could do it all again? Was he floating around the skies in solitude, with nothing to do and suddenly decide he was going to create something, just because he can?

So what GOD?

Personally, I swayed from one opinion to another. I was raised as a Catholic. But lucky little me, my parents weren't devout Catholics. In fact, my mother was non-practicing and my dad grew up as a Catholic because it was the only way to get him into the French-Catholic school in Amsterdam. He was atheist by his own beliefs.

When I was growing up, I never took the whole God and Jesus thing very seriously and always questioned what they put in front of me. There were stories in the bible that I actually liked and there were stories that I couldn't find myself interested in at all.

Recently, I have started reading books again after a long time of absence. My children occupied that absence, but now that my youngest doesn't constantly need my entertainment skills, there is time for books.
I came across one of my old favourites and started reading it again.
There was a question that made me think. It's from the book Ishmael by Daniel Quinn. I don't have it in front of me, so I'll just use my own words.
"Why did God and the prophets skip some?" What they meant by that is that God and his prophets, the way it is described by modern society and civilization has never taken a place in some parts in the world. The tribes people of the Amazon for instance, never had a prophet to tell them how to live their lives. And even though some of these tribes, if not all, would have been seen as savages by many Westerners, the way they live(d) seemed to be in perfect harmony with all that surrounds them. They don't need one man or book to tell them how to live and how to respect each other and all life around them. They don't 'take' more than what they need. You won't see those people pick fruit in the jungle and store it in fridges. No - they take what they need, eat or use it and then go back for more when it's needed.
Unlike in our 'taker' culture, as they call it in this book. There's something to ponder about I believe. No God or one entity and no prophet or book to tell them otherwise and yet: all is fine under the sun.

I'd like to take it one step further.
There is not a dog or cow or bird on this planet that has any worry in their mind about how to live their lives.
They don't worry about what happened yesterday or what comes tomorrow. Only the present is what's important to them. Food and water, maybe shelter. That's it. No worries about upcoming floods or droughts. No worries at all.
And I think the same would be the case for these tribes in the Amazon. Life happens. No need to linger in the past or worry about the future, if you don't have an idea of what the future brings.
Ignorance is bliss. Or so they say. But maybe it is the opposite.
Maybe these people know the secret of life and how to live.
The book Ishmael, to me, was a reminder as to why I personally don't believe in the god of the bible or any of the holy books.

source: giphy.com

So what about all the pain and suffering in the world?

There is a young Scottish comedian by the name of Kevin Bridges who had a funny explanation.
I quote: "Maybe God created the world, but then he fucked off." When he comes back, he thinks: "Take a look at this place."

The people of the Western gods would probably explain the pain and suffering and all the other bad things that happen as tests from god mixed in with a person's free will. Free will to do good or to do bad. Good things happen to good people, but good things also happen to bad people and vice versa. A bad person who suffers bad experiences in life isn't just going to have the best of luck once he decides to better himself. And the other way around: A good person who has always had great things in life can have disastrous things happen to him all of a sudden.

The believers of the new age movements will most likely say that we can all make our own futures as we are all gods in our own right. But a mother who always has positive thoughts and lives the best possible life according to her own godly instincts, can suffer loss and sorrow if her children are not on the same life-path. Because that is basically it, isn't it?
I can be as positive as I want to be, and positively believe my children into health and a happy life, if those children only believe in doom and sorrow then what will happen next? Will I get my way or will they?

I think the tribes-men have it right. There is no greed in these places. Or the hunger for power and wealth. All these people are concerned about is how to live their lives into the next day. Of course, if a person in those tribes suffers the loss of a loved one, they mourn. I'm pretty sure they do. But then they go back to their daily routines and see it as what it is: part of life. Will they think back sometimes to remember that person?
Of course they do. But what they probably don't do is rethink the situation: "If I only..." or "Maybe, if I would have been there sooner." And so on. I believe that only we do that. The godly and new age people. The atheists and agnostics as well. The people in the civilized world.

My view?

OK, this could be as hard as the main question itself. I haven't made up my mind about it 100%. Why not? Probably because I belong to the group of people who do rethink events of the past. And there we have it.
Rethinking the past = equals living in the past = equals SUFFERING.

Of course, the tribes in the Amazon, or those in Africa, they suffer sometimes. When there are floods or droughts, they suffer. But it won't always be that way and when that happens, they don't reside in the past. They keep on living.
At the same time, in places where people die of hunger, there is a great amount of suffering. But do these people live in the past and worry about what they could have done differently to prevent this?
Of course not.

If we can believe the words of some, that we all have our own fates in our own hands, then this might have to be explained to these people. Because they obviously don't get it. So what happened to these people?
I'm sure that if they knew they could weave their own reality of a better life, they'd appreciate it if someone told them.
At the same time, I am almost sure that these people suffer by the hands of others. War lords, greedy men, hungry for power. Their own leaders who laid a path of destruction and often with leaders of our Western civilization.
Powered by the media who tell their own versions and TV ads that remind us on a daily basis of the horrors and suffering these poor African babies have to endure by the hands of the same people who OWN their leaders and the media and those TV ads. I mean, don't even get me started on those supposed do-gooders of charities that land their ads on TV and show the misery of some of 'God's children'. Do you have any idea what it costs to run a TV commercial for a few minutes a day? No? Well, look into it and maybe you'll find why these images are kept alive and for whom.
It surely isn't truly because they want to help those who are suffering. I think there is a different reason.

Keeping the nightmare alive

In some ways I agree with the thought that we create our own reality. And also that of others. I can be the most positive thinking person on earth, wishing everyone and everything around me only the best in life. If I see these images on TV, there will be nothing I can do about it: I will feel sorry for these poor people. And with that, I create their misery. Now, I can pray to God as much as I like, it won't do those people one inch of good. They could even do the same, and nothing will change. ONLY if we're willing to see that the powers that be, the self-proclaimed gods of this world, those who put the god of the bible on the map in the first place, are going to keep the nightmare going, then maybe things can change. Thoughts and Actions are two of the most powerful things you could think of. As long as our thoughts and vision is blurred by pain, suffering and horror elsewhere in the world (or here) we will keep projecting this into the world. If you join a class full of A students, when you are only a C Student, chances are that this group of students will pull you up to at least being a B student. The other way around, if someone is a good person who always does the right thing, suddenly starts hanging out with a whole group of people who don't give a damn, there is a huge chance that this person is going to go against his own beliefs at some stage. Now try this again, but in a bigger picture...

The god of suffering

source: https://redeeminggod.com/52-god-memes/

In most religious books, pain and suffering nearly equals godliness. Jesus suffered for our sins. Now, that is a message with a big load of pressure. Man, how can we ever make up for that? This guy suffered and died for the sins I am making now, more than 2000 years later. Look at it that way and you will see that these books have set us up for disaster from the beginning. We suffer because of our own actions. But even then, if you live a good life, then you're promised a great afterlife.
Blah die blah. What about this life?

source: 2012data.webs.com

And now we're getting somewhere. Those 'holy' books are a set up in my honest opinion. The presence of God while the world is suffering is the oldest lie in the book. It was meant to make people doubt their own abilities to make the world a better place. The words passive and passion both have pass in them. Think about that for while. I don't like to say that I'm passionate about something, because without me wanting it, I also store the word: "pass" somewhere in my mind.

Of course there are some good ideas on how to be a good person. But do we really need a book or a person to show us the way?
The main subjects in these books always come back to the same old thing: all people suffer and all have a right of entry into the great afterlife. Even those who've done wrong most of their lives. The moment they find Jesus, or Allah, they get the same rights of those who suffered by their hands.
It's those books, religions, leaders, media etc. who keep the nightmare alive.
The nightmare of suffering in the world.

I never felt much for us being our own gods either. Not in the godly kind of way.
What I do feel, however, is that we are all connected. And not just us, but also the animals and trees and plants.
We are all energy and energy is all around us. And if we keep listening to the horror stories and watching it on TV, we keep feeding this beast of injustice. We should learn from the animals and from the plants and trees. They don't think about the past, or the future. Or about suffering around them or far away. They don't suffer the way we do.
They live and let live.
But maybe, if we break free from these chains, look around us to see what's truly happening and then come off our lazy butts and take action, then maybe we might be able to change things.

Even for those who suffer in Africa.