So then, what is our response in a world where suffering is often met with a disinterested look and the idea that it is generally, “for your own good?” How can we challenge the common moral imagination which suggests an utterly teleological approach to suffering? It is my belief that it can only happen by truly listening and fully hearing the testimony of those who suffer for nothing. We can only be jolted out of our complacency by hearing the stories of those who have seen the brutality and injustice firsthand.
The book of Job has challenged me. It has made me question whether or not I’ve been complicit in the suffering of the world. It has forced me to ask whether or not my own “theodicy,” is a way of enforcing the status quo, and it has challenged my own moral imagination. Perhaps then, that is the “point” of the book. Perhaps, we are all called to move from an easy embrace of mystery to an uneasy embrace of social rectification as we encounter and experience the full witness of suffering in our world.
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