Thanks for that -- you make an important and profound point --"the more we justify suffering the less basis we have for saying something is evil at all."
Some religions don't identify suffering as the definition of evil, but, instead, violation of certain rules, allegedly provided by God. It is hard to deal with that. Why does God make such rules? If it is because they are wrong in themselves, then God's inserting himself is of no meaning -- they would be wrong anyway. If it is because he simply decides on some ineffable basis, then what happens if someday he changes his mind?
(This of course is an ancient argument from Plato).
It seems that suffering is really the only possible meaningful definition of evil, in which case, since God created a world so full of suffering (in fact the main operating of creation -- natural selection -- depends on suffering and death as its driving force), aren't we forced in the end to say that God is evil?
Of course there are also good things in the world, so one can say God is doing the best he can, but for good to exist evil must also exist. That is probably true, but then why do we need God in the picture at all?
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