Here is a short list of things we lose in by removing suffering and pain:
1. Courage – what would you need it from?
2. Justice – what is injustice anyway?
3. Compassion – no need to be concerned now.
4. Sacrifice – as there is now nothing to give up.
5. Love – because there is no freedom to suffer and choose.
The sticky problem we can get into is this:
“Suffering” and “pain” are – or can be – subjective words.
Suffering can be going without food, sitting in a cubicle, losing a family member, or not being able to afford a private jet. And pain can be the loss of a limb or a slight headache.
You get the point.
As I have pointed to before, wishing pain and suffering to simply go away assumes a good bit.
Among the other goods are courage in the face of danger, standing against injustice, showing compassion and empathy, the freedom to love, sacrificing one’s own good for the good of someone else. These are among the goods that we value most highly, and all of them are by their very nature responses to and therefore dependent on the possibility of suffering.
-Ravi Zacharias and Vince Vitale, Why Suffering?
