[February 2000 journal entry]
“No one is innocent” – the polite but emphatic response of a physician to a colleague who had shared his views about tragedy, innocent suffering, and “the silence of God”. I think the theology implicit in the statement “No one is innocent”, when examined vigorously and critically, implicates ‘God’ and must be challenged if human suffering is to be considered innocent. Anchored by a literal view of ‘original sin’, the ‘religious’ Traditional/Orthodox (T/O) paradigm (1) makes human suffering a consequence and punishment for ‘the fall’ and (2) requires a pre-modern/pre-scientific interpretation of Genesis 1-3. I think everyone has to contend with forces that pull strongly away from a commitment to contribute to and advocate for the relief/recovery from physical, mental, and socio-economic suffering.
