Poll: Most Americans Don't Blame God For Disasters

By Nicole Neroulias
Religion News Service

(RNS) We may never know why bad things happen to good people, but most Americans -- except evangelicals -- reject the idea that natural disasters are divine punishment, a test of faith or some other sign from God, according to a new poll.

The poll released Thursday (March 24), by Public Religion Research Institute in partnership with Religion News Service, was conducted a week after a March 11 earthquake triggered a devastating tsunami and nuclear crisis in Japan.

Nearly six in 10 evangelicals believe God can use natural disasters to send messages -- nearly twice the number of Catholics (31 percent) or mainline Protestants (34 percent). Evangelicals (53 percent) are also more than twice as likely as the one in five Catholics or mainline
Protestants to believe God punishes nations for the sins of some citizens.

The poll found that a majority (56 percent) of Americans believe God is in control of the earth, but the idea of God employing Mother Nature to dispense judgment (38 percent of all Americans) or God punishing entire nations for the sins of a few (29 percent) has less support.

From Noah's fabled flood to 21st-century disasters like Hurricane Katrina and the 2010 earthquake in Haiti, some people blame incomprehensible calamities on human sinfulness.

Such interpretations often offend victims, however. Public outcry prompted Tokyo Gov. Shintaro Ishihara to apologize for calling the disaster a "divine punishment" for Japanese egoism.

"It's interesting that most Americans believe in a personal God and that God is in control of everything that happens in the world ... but then resist drawing a straight line from those beliefs to God's direct role or judgment in natural disasters," noted Robert P. Jones, CEO of Public Religion Research Institute.

The poll found that most racial and ethnic minority Christians (61 percent) believe natural disasters are God's way of testing our faith -- an idea that resonates with African-Americans' history of surviving through slavery and racial discrimination.

(Japan's population is predominantly Shinto or Buddhist -- religions that view nature as a force beyond our control or understanding -- but the poll could not get a representative sample of those groups in the United States.)

In other findings:

Most white evangelicals (84 percent) and minority Christians (76 percent) believe God is in control of everything that happens in the world, compared to slimmer majorities of white mainline Protestants (55 percent) and Catholics (52 percent).

Nearly half of Americans (44 percent) say the increased severity of recent natural disasters is evidence of biblical "end times," but a larger share (58 percent) believe it is evidence of climate change. The only religious group more likely to see natural disasters as evidence of
"end times" (67 percent) than climate change (52 percent) is white evangelicals.

Across political and religious lines, roughly eight in 10 Americans say government relief aid to Japan is very important (42 percent) or somewhat important (41 percent), despite our current
economic problems.

"After one of these disasters, people turn to their clergy and their theologians and they look for answers, and there are no great answers," said Gary Stern, author of Can God Intervene? How Religion Explains Natural Disasters.

"But almost every group believes you have to help people who are suffering."

The question of God's role in, and humans' response to, disasters has long vexed the world's major religious traditions, Stern said, even as answers often remain elusive.

Prompted by the 2004 tsunami that devastated Southeast Asia, Stern interviewed dozens of American ministers, priests, imams, rabbis, monks, professors and nonbelievers about their theories. They offered disparate views, sometimes at the same time: forces of nature are impersonal; God s all-knowing but not all-powerful; nature is destructive because of original sin or collective karma; victims are sinners; suffering helps test our faith and purify us.

"The evangelical world is definitely focused on original sin and on the general sinfulness of our world ... and it won't end until Christ returns," Stern said. "In the mainline world, their theology is not well-suited to why God allows these things to happen, so their emphasis is on looking for God in the rescue efforts. And Catholics feel that suffering makes us holy, and there are mysteries that we can't answer in this life, and we'll find the answers in the next life."

But among evangelicals, there's a wide gulf between the fundamentalist perspective that sees disasters as proof of God's wrath and the moderate view that sees "a distinction between an earthquake as part of God's plan and God causing that earthquake," said R. Douglas Geivett, a religion professor at Biola University in California.

"There are a lot of things that I wouldn't cause to happen to my children to teach them certain lessons, but I might allow them to happen, so they might learn the lesson," said Geivett, a former president of the Evangelical Philosophical Society.

"This is tragic, but if you ask (why God allows) earthquakes, you have to ask it anytime that people die. We would have to be prophets of God to know that."

The PRRI/RNS Religion News Poll was based on telephone interviews of 1,008 U.S. adults between March 17 and 20. The poll has a margin of error of plus or minus 3 percentage points.

Comments

[LightShadow62]

07:24 PM on 03/29/2011

I do not blame 'god' for disaster but neither do I credit 'god' with anything else.

[satanlite]

05:06 PM on 03/29/2011

Americans are far more complex and dare I say intelligent than most of the blowhards on the right and left want to indicate.

[LightShadow62]

07:23 PM on 03/29/2011

You can't prove it by the people who get voted into office.

[jwb2013]

11:04 AM on 03/29/2011

what a joke. anything that would even resemble a 'god' out there, would most certainly be above human frailties like, 'anger', 'hate', or even 'judgment'. there are ideas that surpass 'good' and 'bad'. but we humans are only capable of so much...and knowing our own connection to our divinity seems to top the list.

[Nebska]

11:32 AM on 03/28/2011

As a former fundamentalist Christian, which is what we used to call ourselves before 9/11, I can tell you that environmental devastation is almost joyously accepted as a sign of the End Times by the fundamentals I knew. On the other hand, the United Nations, which is seen as a forerunner of the foretold one-world-government, also a sign of the End Times, is fought against tooth and nail. When I was in it, decades ago, it was confusing. Having been out of it for awhile and rethought my world view, fundamentalism strikes me as absurd, irrational, and dangerous. I know their fervor first hand.

[Nebska]

11:46 AM on 03/28/2011

I should also note that all of the dozen or so young people with whom I was friends in the church those years ago have left it. It took some longer than others but they are all on other paths, spiritually

[paleoimage]

11:06 AM on 03/28/2011

The "sand religions" are so anti-women it's pathetic. The bronze age stories claim that god is male and he controls everything - except when he employs mother nature to bring to his fallen creations, the plagues, earthquakes, tsunamis, hurricanes and avalanches to punish us for our lack of faith and failures of submission. He began these tragedies because of an original sin ... resulting from the first woman, Eve, (his creative afterthought) was talked into defying god by a snake. (a little phallic imagery, perhaps?) According to Judeo/Christian/Islamic traditions, the male is the spiritual head of the household, and a woman's worth is half or less of that of a male. Women can never be treated as equals while they continue to embrace Christianity and Islam.

[Aesthete]

10:24 AM on 03/29/2011

The subjugation of women was not the original intent of Christianity. That is man's doing. It is written in the scriptures, "In Christ there is neither male nor female, bond nor free, but all are one in Christ." Many of the facilitators of the spread of the early Christian church were women. When the Romans finally accepted Christianity, it was subverted into an "all-boys" club that pushed women aside. Another great fallacy is that women are exclusively to blame for "original sin." Adam was equally culpable. Both Adam and Eve were banished from the Garden of Eden.

[jestermarcus]

03:28 PM on 03/29/2011

I wonder what would have happened if Jesus had been born a woman? I get the feeling she would have been laughed into excile or worse.

[Benjamin Barclay Amsden]

09:06 PM on 03/27/2011

Ishihara has a history of making contoversial statements, some examples of which are his claims that homosexual people are defective, that all Chinese, Pakistanis and Iranians in Japan are drug dealers and that women who cant have children are useless.
The guy has some seriously bigoted opinions and doesn't think before he opens his mouth.

[nenitaB]

02:01 AM on 03/27/2011

Many catastrophies have happened in the ,the biggest ones I haven't witnessed . Not with some related to environment and climate but big quakes , tsunamis, hurricanes usually we relate it with God. Tthese alone show the existence of God no one dares answer for that . If we ask how this happened again it's a mystery . no one knows the reason who else but we turn to God as the answer. And with this it's more comfortable I suppose.

[jestermarcus]

03:44 PM on 03/29/2011

Thats just it though, there is no mystery when it comes to things like this anymore. We pretty much have it all down. Little minor things here and there that surprise us still but we are well equiped to figure that stuff out as well. Earthquakes, Hurricanes, Tornadoes, Volcanos, ect. all if it, we have figured them all out pretty much. Whether god made the condidtions for them to occure could still be questioned I guess. You imply that because we don't know something it must be god doing. That is completly untrue. Hundreds of years ago we didn't understand things and we thought it was simply god doing, yet now we know exactly how they occure. Its all a matter of time.

[nenitaB]

09:06 AM on 03/30/2011

Still many not only Americans don't blame God for all these disasters so that means they have trust and faith in Him. Scientists, experts are still researching how this happen so at least we can anticipate and do something to prevent or minimize the degree of damages and loss of lives. Yes, in time there will be results.

[nenitaB]

01:38 AM on 03/27/2011

I'm inclined to believe the PRRI poll is correct. I have to say this question and results are from those who are believers and have full trust in God. These followers still outnumbered those who are not . those who'll contradict is because still a great number are skeptical . There are no good enough answer . for them There is indeed mystery surrounding the issue on God and religion

[Teki Abary Repalda]

08:19 PM on 03/26/2011

I would like to offer an understanding of what Gov. Ishihara said, what it really meant in the context of the Japanese and why it was frowned upon.

The governor used the word: "tenbatsu." Tenbatsu does not really mean "divine punishment" from a God. As pointed out by the author, Japanese are either Shinto or Buddhist. The more appropriate meaning for tenbatsu is "scourge from heaven." Note that the Japanese philosophies reflect upon their appreciation and awe of nature as a driving force uncontrolled by humanity.

Furthermore, i would not say that the Japanese were "offended" by Gov Ishihara's use of "tenbatsu", in the sense that Westerners get offended by certain use of words. But it was definitely frowned upon because of the level of appropriateness given the situation. It was not about what he meant, but the timing of what he said that he had to apologize.

The Japanese culture is deeply rooted in formality and honor-aesthetics. They not particularly concerned in a God-concept. What was warranted of Gov. Ishihara was not to "rub it in" and for him not to capitalize upon the existing grief of the people.

[ThirdSection]

08:08 PM on 03/25/2011

I don't see why anyone would blame God for earthquakes, which are obviously caused by the giant turtle that the Earth rests upon when he sneezes.

[jestermarcus]

03:31 PM on 03/29/2011

Would somebody please get him some flu medicine?!?!?!

[ThirdSection]

05:23 PM on 03/29/2011

Make sure it's the non-drowsy kind. Untold disaster awaits if that turtle stops walking around in circles.

[nenitaB]

11:34 AM on 03/31/2011

That's a chuckling line, suddenly my eyelids getting heavier were gone. At this hour we need it once in a great while .

[RedRat]

06:26 PM on 03/25/2011

Of course religion is not logical so this poll is not terribly surprising. If it were logical and you believe that all flows from God, then God must be responsible for all the bad things that happen. These same religious people are the first to give God great thanks for all the good things, then they ought to blame Him for all the bad things too. But then, as I said, religion and the religious are not logical.

[nenitaB]

11:43 AM on 03/31/2011

It's okay to blame Him but doesn't mean you stop believing , trusting, and having faith on Him.

[RedRat]

08:29 PM on 03/31/2011

I think you made my point better than I did.

[Phil Waste]

06:19 PM on 03/25/2011

The only persons you can trust today is a non-theist.

If they claim to be Christian or have a fish on their cars, run like Hades.

[ThirdSection]

08:03 PM on 03/25/2011

I'd rather run like Hermes. He was faster.

[truthfulman]

05:56 PM on 03/26/2011

Barack Obama is a Christian. Hmmmmm.

[jestermarcus]

03:32 PM on 03/29/2011

So he says, you cant turn on a conservative talk show without them saying he doesn't go to church enough. Maybe they are one to something.

[Phil Waste]

06:00 PM on 03/25/2011

What a joke....They thank 'GOD' for being saved from disaster but never blame 'GOD' for making the disaster.

I remember a bus that went off the road and killed 40 some people and a few survivors thanked 'GOD' for saving them. Who do they think killed 40 some people and why do they think 'GOD' singled them out to survive.

Only trust someone if they are an atheist.

[truthfulman]

05:58 PM on 03/26/2011

"Only trust someone if they are an atheist."

Someone like Joseph Stalin?

[Benjamin Barclay Amsden]

08:43 PM on 03/27/2011

deriving "all athiests are trustworthy" from the assertion that "all thiests are untrustworthy" is a logical fallacy.
However I would agree that it is hyperbolic to claim all thiests are untrustworthy

[Krayorik]

01:33 PM on 05/23/2011

He didn't say "all atheists are trustworthy" he said, "all theists are untrustworthy", so he was saying that atheism is a base line for trust, from which you should work forward, not necessarily trusting all atheists. I hasten to point out that he's still using a fallacy here, because many theists are perfectly trustworthy/reliable, and they're often times perfectly rational in every part of their beliefs except that.

[nenitaB]

11:58 AM on 03/31/2011

Did you ever think when will your time be ? You don't know unless you set your date you'd want to end your life. Death comes in many ways and forms. Those who commits suicide some survive while those who plead for it , die .

[Jack Foley]

03:45 PM on 03/25/2011

Plate tectonics do you speak it?

[jestermarcus]

03:07 PM on 03/25/2011

And yet most Americans believe in god. How ironic.

[bkcomplex]

03:23 PM on 03/25/2011

How sad is what you should have said. When will this nation grow up?

[jestermarcus]

03:26 PM on 03/25/2011

You're right. But I meant it in a way that, they believe god is real and that he controls everything and has a plan, yet he isn't at fault when that plan entails thousands dying a horrible death.