Cause and Effect?

Events happen because something causes them.  Your toe hurts because you smacked it into the door jam.  You’re tired because you stayed up too late the night before.  It’s dark at night because the sun sets.  We may argue about the causes of what we experience (is human activity responsible for climate change? have government regulations killed the coal industry?).  And we may not know what the causes are (why do people get cancer?  what started World War I?).  But we all agree that our world operates under the rule of cause and effect.

Philosophers of religion sometimes refer to God as the “First Cause.”  He ultimately is the cause of everything that happens.  The circumstance that causes one event was itself caused by something else, and so on down the line until we reach God himself as the First Cause.  For example, someone’s house collapses because of an earthquake.  The earthquake occurred because tectonic plates under the earth’s surface grind against each other.  The plates move because of the earth’s structure.  The earth is structured the way it is because…. Eventually we reach the first cause: “because of God.”  And God has no cause.  He is the one who causes everything else.

Lately, however, I’ve been wondering if the rule of cause and effect actually runs the world.  What if some things happen for no reason and with no cause?  For example, medical researchers have not been able to find the cause for some diseases.  Because we believe in cause and effect, we assume that there is a cause, and we hope that more research will find it.  But is that always the case?  Could it be that sometimes when we ask “Why did this happen?” there is simply no reason why?  Not that we can’t figure out or understand why it happened, but that there simply is no cause for it at all.

Unbelievers may chalk such events up to dumb luck or random fate.  Sometimes things just happen, they may say.  Life is one giant coin toss: sometimes you come out heads, and other times for no reason at all you end up with tails.

But as believers, we acknowledge that we are under the control of God’s providential care.  He does not need a reason, or a cause, to do what he does.  Job and his friends spent 35 chapters debating the cause for his affliction.  When God finally spoke, he did not provide a reason or a cause for what happened to Job.  He described his power and his control over the most powerful and the most insignificant happenings in creation.  In essence, he asked Job, “Who are you that you should expect an explanation from me?”  Sometimes, we do not know the cause for what happened because there is none.  There is only the will of God.

In his letter to the Romans, Paul considers the question of God’s justice when he blesses one person instead of another.  He does not explain that the person deserved what they got, or even that there is a purpose beyond human understanding.  He concludes that God’s will needs no reason or explanation: “God has mercy on whom he wants to have mercy, and he hardens whom he wants to harden” (Romans 9:18).

God has blessed us with inquisitive minds and the desire to understand.  But at times, we submit to God’s authority by relinquishing the notion that our actions, or events in God’s creation, can explain what happens to us.  God needs no cause or reason for what he does.

A Requiem for Reasonable Discourse

I avoid posting politically-oriented thoughts on Facebook or my blog.  Experience has taught me that they only create anger among those who disagree, and further entrench convictions held by those who may agree.  No one is enlightened, and everyone simply gains more fodder for their own diatribes.  However, I am going to dip my toes into the water and hope the piranhas don’t devour them.  I’m not expressing support or disapproval about a particular issue, but registering my dismay about what has happened to our nation’s political process.

Today I pulled up notes from a sermon I preached in August 2001, hoping to glean some pearls I might be able to use on Sunday.  While making the point that adversaries may be able to respect and even cooperate with each other, I said “You would think the Democrats and Republicans would want to rip each other apart.  Some countries make that mistake, when they believe that political parties should attack each other at any cost.  Republicans and Democrats may disagree strongly, but they share a common loyalty to the Constitution and to our nation.  When push comes to shove, they work together.  They have different goals and strategies, but they are on the same team.”  Perhaps I was naïve sixteen years ago, but these remarks certainly don’t describe politics in the United States today.  The primary objective of our elected officials has become the ascension of their party over the other.  The welfare of our nation and its people, and respect for the Constitution, have taken a back seat.  At best, they have become talking points put to the service of partisan agendas.

I miss the good old days when we expected our elected officials act with respect and honesty.  Do you remember when a President could face impeachment for lying?  Or the shock we felt when a Vice President told a senator of the other party to “Go f--- yourself”?  At the time, episodes like these seemed to have hit the gutter of partisan politics.  Now, they would barely last a news cycle.  American governance has become a zero-sum game: in order for “my” team to win, the “other” team must lose.  The definition of winning in Washington has become the defeat or embarrassment of the other party.  The deliberative process has lost its give and take.  The goal is to do all of the taking and none of the giving.  The concept that the best result comes from both parties working together is now dismissed as a quaint notion.

If you doubt the hypocrisy that both parties demonstrate, go back eight years when the Democrats had the White House and majorities in both houses of Congress.  The Democrats are now saying what the Republicans did then, and the Republicans are repeating what the Democrats did then.  The majority party blames the minority party for being obstructionist, and the minority party protests that the majority is forcing their agenda upon the nation.  It is not the issues that matter, but who holds the power.

If you are inclined to comment on this post by arguing that the “other” party is to blame for the decline and fall of American governance, take care.  Your comment may simply become one more example of how partisanship has trumped reasoned discourse.  And as the originator of this post, I reserve the right to remove insulting or profane comments. 

Now, let’s see if I can survive those piranhas….