In attempting to remove confusion from some dimensions of what is essentially an insoluble issue, John G. Stackhouse Jr., a professor of religion at the University of Manitoba, has written a book that will work only for those already converted to a belief in a trustworthy God. Acknowledging a world marked by misfortune, malice, and catastrophe, Stackhouse proposes a rationale for believing in a benevolent supreme being. Taking what he considers to be a more historically informed approach than Buddha, Confucius, Lao-zi, Rabbi Kusher, M.Scott Peck, and others, he offers simplified summaries of what philosophers and theologians have contributed to the subject, though he neglects to consider the more complex visions of Karl Barth and Dietrich Bonhoeffer.

Stackhouse does quote David Hume’s 18th-century skepticism: “Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? then he is impotent. Is he able, but not willing? then is he malevolent. Is he both able and willing? whence then is evil?” Stackhouse deals with the problem by changing the terms of reference for evil, and concocting his own theistic solution which, for all his learning, amounts to the essence of tautology. His mantra runs thus: God always does the right thing because he knows best; he thinks infallibly, et cetera. But this is pure wish-fulfillment fantasy. Apparently unable to grapple with the idea of a suffering God, he confidently claims that evil is no more than an adjective, arguing that pain, hardship, and catastrophe produce character. But I say so do bliss and luxury, by testing our levels of appreciation and moderation.

His entire Christian theodicy is rounded off with the self-satisfied neatness of a theorem which, however, is based on an arrogant epistemology. Like every confirmed religious propagandist, Stackhouse presumes to know what God knows and plans, although what he says of the subject smacks too much of deus ex machina for cosmic deficiency and suffering.