I've been on a bit of a Jesus kick lately, for lack of a better term. Praying. Reading the Bible. Attending church. Discussing God with co-workers. This is unlike me, and people are starting to notice. I fear I may be scaring some people; namely, my sister. "How can you believe in God who lets things like this happen?" she asks. And she raises a valid question, one I have asked myself and one many others grapple with. If there is a loving and just God, why is he letting our mom die of cancer? Why does he let people starve and suffer? If God is real, then where in the hell is he?

I am not writing this to convince anyone of God's existence. But try having your mother slowly waste away while you're in the prime of your life and see how you deal with it. Look at her body laying crumpled in the hospital bed like refuse on the side of a highway, shriveled and forgotten. If there is no God, she doesn't matter. Her suffering is in vain. There is nothing more for her after this world; she will rot just like every other living thing. Her death is as insignificant as a tree falling or an insect meeting its demise against the windshield of your car.

Try telling yourself, as you look upon her scant form, that her life means nothing. We all mean nothing. Tell yourself we're here by cosmic chance, that we're floating without purpose or justification. Look up at the vast sky and tell yourself it sits empty. Tell yourself that as your mother writhes in pain, her agony goes unnoticed; her cries remain unheard. Tell yourself that hey, it's merely survival of the fittest, and she didn't make the cut. Comfort yourself with Darwinism and let me know how that works out for you. When you instinctively ask for mercy, remind yourself that there simply is none.

I am moved to believe because of an unwillingness to surrender to the notion that nothing remains after death. I know this is not the truth and I will not accept anything else. I cannot prove there is a heaven nor can I be absolutely sure there is a hell, but deep in my recesses there lies a belief that cannot be shaken. That may make me delusional, that may alienate people, but I don't really give a damn. When your life is going well it is incredibly easy to not need a higher authority. But try having your foundation ripped out from underneath you, try staring death in the face, try grasping for straws. Try to overcome the overwhelming despair and unrelenting sadness. Can you do it through earthly means alone? I cannot.

The question of why bad things happen still remains. If God works miracles, why doesn't he simply heal the world? It is impossible to know. But do we not learn from our hardships? Do we not emerge stronger? Do we not gain understanding and wisdom? If we never encountered troubled waters, how could we ever appreciate the serenity of the beach? Much in the same way that we know atoms exist because we feel their presence without ever seeing them, that is the way in which I know God. There are things in my life that I cannot chalk up to coincidence or luck, and that is why I believe. I won't describe each event, but tell me this: The five-year survival rate for a person with stage 4 colon cancer is 8%. How is my mother alive 11 years after diagnosis? I believe in science. I believe in evolution. I believe in the drugs which cured her. But I know it is God who saved her.

Is there empirical evidence for God? No. But can't we believe without seeing, can't we know without being told? Can't we respect science but acknowledge that it comes up short? There is no grace in science, I'm afraid. And when you look to science and reason to find answers and find none, you may be willing to take a leap of faith.