Farther Along

All week I've been turning to the old hymn Farther Along. My dear friend died suddenly on Saturday, and he was a decent and loving man with three little children. He's gone, and the world is worse for it, but Newt Gingrich lives on. Countless other worthless douchebags continue to take up space and waste air and resources while Dan is lost to us. It makes no sense, and I am left only with the deeply unsatisfying idea that one day God's purposes will be revealed and will be understood. Or maybe not. Maybe I need to be content with the idea that God has a plan, that it involved the tragic and premature death of a great guy, and that I will never ever understand it. I don't suppose that I need to understand it. Maybe there is no divine plan at work here. Maybe it's simply the senseless tragedy that it seems to be and that part of being a sane human is reconciling ourselves to the fact that the universe is unfair. What is the difference among these three stances as a practical matter? None that I can see right now. They each involve resignation to some ineffable and irresistible forces. There's no sense in being angry at the universe or God or whatever one deems the author of these events.