Theodicy via Chris de Burgh

What comes next? How do you move on from recounting a personal tragedy to ... whatever comes next? It is a variant of the jarring juxtapositions one gets in many newscasts, or in flicking the pages of newspapers, or in clicking the next link.

As it happens, my feed-reader clicks took me from the the announcment of Christopher Laurie's tragic death to Michael Bird's reflections on "The Spanish Train - The Odyssey of Theodicy":

Does evil win in the end? ... The answer given in Chris de Burgh's Spanish Train is that evil wins, not in the absence of a God, but despite God. ... But I would say that de Burgh's god more closely resembles the United Nations (emblematic for the self-striving of men and women against the tsunami of human depravity) and not the God who made himself known in the cross and resurrection of Jesus Christ. ... Does God win then? ...

For Michael's answer and the rest of his reflections, read the whole thing.