If the Universe is friendly, why is there so much hostility?

"The important thing is not to stop questioning. Curiosity has its own reason for existing. One cannot help but be in awe when he contemplates the mysteries of eternity, of life, of the marvelous structure of reality. It is enough if one tries merely to comprehend a little of this mystery every day. Never lose a holy curiosity."--Einstein

Daniel Wilcox raised some good questions in response to my recent blog, "Is the Universe friendly?, and they are not easy to answer. If the "arc of the moral universe bends towards justice," why is there so much injustice? Why are people inclined to war and oppression? Why do earthquakes, floods and diseases strike down the just as well as unjust? You might as well ask: Why is there darkness, as well as light?

Asking questions like these implies that there is something inside us that cries out for justice. I know all too well how painful it is to lose someone to disease who doesn't "deserve" to die. When I was a youth director for my wife's church, a twelve-year-old named Christian came down with a virulent form of cancer. He earned his name and was the epitome of virtue, an artistic young man who loved his sister, treated everyone with kindness and certainly didn't deserve to die young. My wife Kathleen and I spent a lot of time visiting him and his family. Christian was a model patient, caring, funny, and eager to live. When he died, his hippie-themed memorial was a beautiful testimony to life well spent, but far too short. Shortly after his death, my wife was diagnosed with cancer and we went on a ten-month cancer journey together that tested our faith and our love for each other. Despite the prayers of many people, people of diverse faiths, my wife died all too soon and too young. I grieve such losses. Such deaths don't make sense, unless there is an afterlife in which souls live on to fulfill their destiny. But even if you don't believe in an afterlife, I am convinced that a life well lived is not wasted. Christian and Kathleen have inspired me, and many others, to live a life worthy of their example. They live on in my heart, for which I am deeply grateful.

We don't choose these natural evils that break open our hearts. They are part of the human condition, and the fabric of the universe. Without disease and death, the universe as we know it could not function.

But there is another kind of evil that is not inevitable.  It is based on human choice, the decision to do what is harmful to oneself or others. We usually do this unconsciously, unaware of how our actions are affecting others. But often we are in denial. We rationalize decisions that hurt others because they benefit us. As Scott Peck points out in his book "People of the Lie," this denial is what constitutes evil.

Our Quaker faith teaches that the Light shines in the darkness of every soul, and cannot be extinguished (or understood). It can guide us towards a life of love and justice towards all. But we have a choice. We can live according to the Light or we can deny it. If we deny it, we live in darkness and sooner or later we resort to violence, violence towards ourselves or others.

What physics teaches is that there is order in the physical universe, a tendency for matter to organize itself into more and more complex organisms. These organisms come to embody the Light that we call conscience or morality. As we become increasingly aware, we realize that we are all interconnected, and we need to act accordingly. This is the basis of morality. As Einstein observed:

"A human being is a part of the whole, called by us Universe, a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings as something separated from the rest-a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest to us. Our task must be to free from this prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole nature in its beauty."

The delusion of separateness is related to another cosmic tendency: entropy. This is the tendency to disorder, to death. When we embrace separation and isolation instead of connection and compassion, we align ourselves with the forces of entropy and death. This is what religious people call "sin."

These two tendencies are what create the moral Light and Darkness of the universe. Faith teaches us that the light of love is stronger, more enduring than the darkness. As Martin Luther King says so beautifully: "Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that."

As Daniel points out, Einstein was a "strict determinist" and didn't believe in a personal God. He described himself as an agnostic who had a deep admiration for mysticism. He profoundly admired the Quakers, as he made clear when he gave an address at Haverford College in the 1930s. Einstein was not a mystic, but he appreciated the "mystic emotion," a sense of awe at the mystery of the universe. I'd like to conclude with what Einstein had to say about his religious life:

The finest emotion of which we are capable is the mystic emotion. Herein lies the germ of all art and all true science. Anyone to whom this feeling is alien, who is no longer capable of wonderment and lives in a state of fear is a dead man. To know that what is impenetrable for us really exists and manifests itself as the highest wisdom and the most radiant beauty, whose gross forms alone are intelligible to our poor faculties - this knowledge, this feeling ... that is the core of the true religious sentiment. In this sense, and in this sense alone, I rank myself among profoundly religious men.