Why?
One day, the eighteenth-century Polish rabbi Baal Shem-Tov and his students were standing on a hill when foreign troops invaded their town. From their vantage point on the hill, they were able to see all the horror and violence of the attack. The rabbi looked up to Heaven and cried out, "Oh, if only I were God." A student asked, "But, Master, if you were God, what would you do differently?" The rabbi answered him, "If I were God, I would do nothing differently. If I were God, I would understand." [1] In today’s gospel reading, [2] many in the crowd that had gathered to hear Jesus were galvanized by news of a recent tragedy: Pilate's soldiers had killed some Galilean Jews while they were offering sacrifices in the Temple. Why would God allow this? Similarly, why had the tower of Siloam collapsed and killed eighteen people? Why did God allow that to happen? Our questions echo the crowd’s questions. Why did God allow two Boeing 737 Max 8 pl