John Stackhouse: Can God Be Trusted?

February 8, 2010

After learning of the magnitude-7 earthquake that hit Haiti just a few weeks ago, killing an estimated 170-thousand people, displacing millions more, leaving thousands hungry, leaving orphans without parents or even carers, and resulting in some of them now becoming vulnerable to human trafficking.

Open House presenter Sheridan Voysey found himself hanging his head and saying ‘God… why Haiti?

Sheridan who visited Haiti two years ago saw the dusty streets, the car wrecks everywhere, the UN tanks and armed soldiers stationed on every corner. He recounts 'I’ll never forget seeing whole families living in half-built bessar-brick shanty homes, built brick-by-brick as they could afford to buy each brick. I’ll never forget the scores of people lining the main roads of Port-au-Prince, selling old shoes, mattresses or little bags of water to earn an income. I’ll never forget some of the buildings we walked through, looking at the crumbling concrete and brick work and wondering if they were safe. I’ll never forget the half-clothed children, the street dogs, the unemployment rate, the little boy telling me how thankful he and his family were to find one potato to eat one night.'

The Haitian earthquake has sparked sceptics and atheists, and also many who suffer to level the ultimate question;  'Why would a good God allow such tragedies to happen?' On the Open House program last night Sheridan Voysey posed this question to John Stackhouse, a theologian of some note, and the author of Can God Be Trusted?

Listen Now - Why does a good God allow tradegies to happen?