Why not just thank your lucky stars?

I am very disturbed by the remarks of Jordan Aubey, a survivor of the horrific Joplin tornado which took the lives of 132 persons, as reported in the May 26 Daily Herald. As the tornado tore through his apartment, everything was destroyed but the bathtub he clung to, and he survived.

He declared, “I feel like I’ve been in the hand of God this past month,” noting that he faced death a few weeks earlier when his spleen ruptured. “Doctors told me both times, ‘If not for God, you wouldn’t be around,’” said Aubey.

When a fortunate individual gives credit this way to God for his survival, what is he in effect saying to the families of those victims who did not survive?

Is he telling them that, while God favored him with survival, God disfavored those who did not survive? That would place God in the position of acting arbitrarily, blessing some of us with salvation while not favoring others, and I myself would not want to honor and worship such an arbitrarily acting god.

Personally, I do not believe God played any role in connection with these tornadoes and other natural disasters. Such natural disasters happen at random, and God plays no role in preserving the lives of some of us while taking the lives of those who died. I myself would feel much better if the survivors of such disasters simply said they were lucky and fortunate to have survived, and let it go at that.

Theodore M. Utchen

Wheaton