Evil and the Problem of Jesus

Evil and the Problem of Jesus approaches age-old questions about God’s relationship with evil (theodicy) from an entirely fresh angle. Rather than tweaking airy abstractions, it makes Jesus’ interactions with evil our primary source for thinking about theodicy.

This Christ-centered approach reveals the failure of traditional theodicy to be intellectually convincing or spiritually satisfying. Unlike that fossilized intellectual heritage, Christodicy (evil-and-Jesus) provides original insights into divine power, presence, and love that help us reengage the God Jesus reveals and the evil Jesus challenges. Presenting Jesus as a model for how to be fully human, it crafts new ways to envision our own multidimensional relationships with God and with evil.

Written with both breadth and focus, the book includes pastoral experiences of tragedy, suffering, and evil; retraces philosophical, multifaith, and biblical insights; and explores the ways the Gospels describe Jesus’ complex interactions with evil.

Evil and the Problem of Jesus asks pointed questions and offers thoughtful conceptual frameworks to help people live more faithfully, compassionately, wisely, and justly in response to the evils around us, among us, and within us.

Gary Commins is a retired Episcopal priest who exercised his forty-year ministry in urban, suburban, inclusive, bilingual, and multicultural settings. He is the author of three other books, including If Only We Could See: Mystical Vision and Social Transformation (2015). He received an honorary doctorate for his work that has blended scholarship with ministry.