Why is there evil?
The hardest objection to God, with Thomas Aquinas and the Catechism.
If God is good and can do anything, why is there so much evil? It is the most common objection to God's existence, and for many it is not a theory but something they have lived through. Thomas Aquinas took it very seriously, and the Church answers with the whole of her faith: what evil is, where it comes from, what the fall and original sin mean, and how God himself answers in Christ.
Read the argument in short first. Then walk through it step by step, and at each step pick the most common objection to see how to answer it.
The argument in short
The argument in five sentences, to learn by heart.
- Evil is not a thing God has made, but the lack of some good that ought to be there.
- God never wills sin. It comes from created beings with free will turning away from him.
- God permits evil, because he is so good and powerful that he can bring good even out of evil.
- Human beings misused their freedom from the very beginning. The Church calls this the fall, and original sin is its result.
- God answers evil in Christ: where sin abounded, grace abounded more exceedingly.
Concepts you needAct and potency · Cause
Act and potency actus, potentiaPotency is the capacity to become or receive something. Act is its actually being so. What receives something is in potency to it, and what is received is its act.
Example
A seed is a tree in potency, a grown tree is a tree in act. Cold water is hot in potency, until someone heats it.
In Thomas
Thomas applies the concepts to existence: what receives its existence is related to it as potency to act (De ente et essentia, ch. 3). In God there is no potency, and so his essence and his being are one (Summa theologiae I q.3 a.4).
Cause causa fiendi, causa essendiA cause is what something depends on. Thomas distinguishes the cause of a thing coming to be from the cause of its being. He also distinguishes chains whose links merely follow one another from chains where each link acts right now through the one before.
Example
A builder is the cause of a house coming to be, but the house still stands when he goes home. The sun is the cause of the light in the air, and the light vanishes the moment the sun stops shining.
In Thomas
The builder and the sun are Thomas's own examples, in Summa theologiae I q.104 a.1. He writes about the two kinds of chain in I q.46 a.2, reply 7: a stone moved by a stick, moved by a hand, compared with generations where one man is begotten by another.
Step by step
or tap a box in the map to see the texts behind it.
Test yourself
Think of your answer first. Nothing is saved.
What is evil according to Thomas?
The lack of some good that ought to be there, as blindness is the lack of sight. Evil is not a thing of its own that God has made.
Why can't we say that God causes sin?
God in no way wills sin. It comes from created beings with free will turning away from him. God permits it, but does not cause it.
Why does God permit evil?
Because he is so good and powerful that he can bring good even out of evil. If all evil were prevented, much good would be missing, such as the patience of the martyrs.
How do you answer someone who says original sin is unfair?
Original sin is not personal guilt. It is a sin contracted and not committed: human nature lacks the holiness it had at the beginning.
What does the Church mean by "O happy fault"?
That through Christ God has made something even greater out of the fall. Where sin abounded, grace abounded more exceedingly.