(July 9, 2023 at 11:50 am)FlatAssembler Wrote: When you ask them why would an omnipotent and good God allow evil in the world, the most common response Christians (and I imagine Muslims, but I am not sure about that) give is something along the lines of: "Suffering is a necessary consequence of free will, and it is more important to God to allow free will than to eliminate suffering. All the suffering is ultimately caused by free will.". What do you think, what is the most effective response to that?
I think one of the best responses to that is: "Suffering has existed for hundreds of millions of years before free will, unless you will claim non-human animals have free will and should be held responsible for their actions.". I have started a thread about that on Christianity StackExchange. Honestly, the responses I received there are so ridiculous that I think my time would be better spent elsewhere.
This is not a very complex argument from the Christian perspective.
I would provide a simple response such as this....what aspect of free will allows an infant to suffer from disease or be sacrificed (which still happens in the world) or suffer in anyway? What component of free will is an infant not exercising that would prevent them from suffering this way?
