Divine Providence through Predictable Chance Events: A Problem for Non-Competitive Accounts of Divine Action

Abstract

This article addresses the question, ‘How can divine providence be reconciled with statistically random events?’ To limit the scope of the article, I focus on one popular version of meticulous providence that relies upon the primary/secondary causation distinction, influentially defended by Kathryn Tanner and her book God and Creation in Christian Theology. I argue that modern conceptions of chance and probability have made it more difficult to interpret chance events as part of God's meticulous providence since divine intentions in nature are expressed in ways that remove evidence of their purpose. The difficulty for meticulous providence is not that some events seem too random to be reconciled to God's providence, but rather the opposite: chance events do not have specific purpose behind them because they are predictable. I conclude that any satisfactory theological response to the problem of randomness necessitates a robust account of general providence that cannot be reduced to special providence.