Meaning

At various discussion groups with Dr. Levenson and fellow students, the topic of suffering has come up. He made a very good point, that no matter how we view it, applying our theory to specific instances offers no comfort. Karma. God's will. For the greater good. It will balance out in the end. Random chance. For a rather potent example of that, read the comments here. If the supposed purpose of a religion is "comfort," the idea that anyone in the tsunami somehow deserved his/her fate is anything but comforting: it's revolting. It's no better than the gods-bedamned evangelists blaming every catastrophe on homosexuals.

Do I think there was a purpose to the tsunami? Not in the sense that most people would mean. It was an event. It had consequences, the most obvious ones horrific. That was its "purpose." Its purpose was not to wipe out human life. That was a consequence of time and place. There's no sense in asking "why?" There's no comfort to be found in reasons: quite the contrary, in fact. The more you hear them, the more they become meaningless platitudes. Looking for an overarching, universal meaning is futile.

But looking for a personal meaning, that just might get you somewhere. What does the event mean to you? How does it affect you? Was there any sense in which you contributed to it, or worked against it? Was it something completely out of your control? And, yes, these are fundamentally selfish questions, but they're far less selfish than foisting meaningless and empty platitudes upon the grieving. The last thing a grieving person wants to hear is that it was Fate, or God's Plan, or Karma. You may as well slap them in the face as tell them that.

And if the event had no personal effect on you, find something useful to do, rather than serve up useless platitudes.