(Interesting letter, written by a close friend… Rowland)

As I read Stephen Ames’ article in the May edition of The Melbourne Anglican (Stephen Fry — God Loves You!), I tried to imagine I was Stephen Fry, and wondered whether the article would persuade me to abandon or modify my firmly held conviction that “the idea of a universally loving god is just manifest nonsense”.

One of the key issues raised by Dr.Ames was God’s interventionism, or lack thereof. For instance: “God does not generally order the life of the created universe by intervening in a myriad of situations every day.” And why not? “(Because) that would completely contradict God’s goodness and wisdom.”

If I were Fry, I would find this puzzling. To use Fry’s example of “two-year-old children screaming in agony of bone cancer”, I would have thought that a God who intervened to heal such children would be showing far more “goodness and wisdom” than a God who had the ability to intervene but chose not to.

Furthermore, if God does not intervene “in a myriad of situations every day”, does this mean we can expect some interventions onsome days? If so, Fry would be entitled to ask: If God has the power, ability and goodness to intervene in human affairs at all, why does He do it so infrequently, so sparingly and so randomly? And on what basis or bases does He choose when to intervene and when not to? Fry might well argue that God could be charged under the French law of negligent homicide, which applies to people who have the ability and opportunity to save a person or persons in mortal peril, but refuse or fail to do so.

And in terms of human suffering, Fry may well agree with Janet Down (Over to You, June TMA) that “just because all will be well one day, does not mean that meaningless suffering now is okay. The end does not justify the means.”

In view of all the above, I suspect that Stephen Fry may yet need further convincing before he accepts that he is loved by a universally loving God. Any and all suggestions gratefully received.

Rowan Forster