saint heyShepard said "My wife as a nurse sees horrific events and wonders why the Trinity would let this all continue... but I don't have an answer." This deserves a thread Brother al
My answer is: We simply Don't Know! For thousands of years smart folks have tried to come up with reasonable explanations but those just beg other questions and whys. It goes back to the original question. Why did God makes us the weak Humans that we are? He knew full well the dark and bloody history that would follow? It's a Great Mystery that won't be answered in full till the Last Day I'm guessing? GOD SAVE ALL HERE!!
It's all about free will and sin. Suffering is the result of sin. Yet, it is also through those offering up suffering that reparation for sin is obtained. It is the scale of life that we are weighed on.
Evil is a Mystery. As Fatima says, it is fundamentally a result of sin, a loss of perfection and holy balance in the universe as a result of the rejection of good. As God is the ground of being, And as Evil is the absence of Good, so Evil can exist in the impersonal form of an earthquake because the devils and men that have sinned have caused upheaval in the grounding of being. Even inanimate matter has its being grounded by God. In this world made imperfect by sin this matter can rear up and do evil. Matter, of course, is wholly incapable of evil in itself, but in this way can be an agent of Evil. That's all very esoteric, and entirely useless when replying to atheists who love to bring this subject up. However, using Evil to make the argument that God doesn't or couldn't exist does not take the Evil away-it just guarantees it is meaningless and cannot be atoned for. To paraphrase Georges Barnanos, the first five minutes of the Beatific Vision will wipe all our suffering away.
I believe your correct. We do not know the people she comes in contact with and what their sins are but there is definitely something called redemptive suffering. It is especially hard for Barb to go with what they call "brave New nursing" this is where the doctor says the quality of life of a patient is no longer there so it's time to end their life... my wife cannot do it and ends up quitting. I agree with her but doesn't help the financial situation. She thought that nursing was a noble profession and has tried to live it that way but appears to be bucking the secular system. She was even chastised at a Catholic nursing home by a nun because she sent an elder to the hospital because of a cardiac issue. To boot the lady was a full code.
Suffering in itself may be an abstract evil, but it can be used for good. My late mother suffered great pain in her final years, but the more she suffered the more truly happy she seemed to become and was radiantly in peace at the end. This suffering certainly brought her very close (at least) to sanctity and was an inspiration to everyone who knew her. Euthanasia will deprive its victims/practitioners of such opportunities for what might be the greatest quality of life they could experience. As for Evil, it is not lessened by increasing it.
Sometimes bad things happen to people to bring them closer to God, but this can be hard to explain to those suffering but often I believe it is true.
As the saintly theologian Father John Hardon stated in a talk on sin, " the only real evil in the world is sin. Sin has two effects: guilt and debt. The debt that we owe God is expiation. The expiation is the pain we owe God. All sin involves suffering. The good news is others may offer expiation for our sins. If that were not true then the suffering of the innocent would have no meaning".
