Why is there evil and suffering?

[Agnosticsherbet]

6. In th past GOD filled in the empty places in knowledge of the universe...

with a narrative of myth.

As human knowledge filled the holes those places where God brought such comfort have disappeared. We know that the world is ancient. There is no scientific argument that counters an ancient earth.

We know that lightning is caused when masses of air rub together until the energy exceeds the capacitance of the atmosphere that the sparks over the resistance in the atmosphere. We know that thunder is caused by lightning. We can not make a theological argument that God, angels, Thor, or Bael Hammon are the cause.

We have considerable evidence that Planets condense from stellar clouds with the stars the orbit. They are not revealed by the parting of waters or vomited up by cosmic turtles.

With mathematics, we can even glimpse creation of a universe from nothing.

There are fewer and fewer places where God fits.

But because we as a species evolved with God and religion, many need the comfort of God and deny science so they can keep those places in the framework of their experience for God to fill. For those people, science may explain but never comforts, and needing comfort rather than explanations, they deny science and hold to myth.