I think this story is horrible, but then I’m just a normal compassionate human being, and not the god of the Bible.

A four-year-old boy has been killed by a falling bullet that was fired into the air during New Year’s Eve celebrations in the US.

Marquel Peters was playing a video game inside a church in the state of Georgia when the bullet pierced the roof and hit him in the head, local media reported.

He collapsed on the floor alongside his parents, bleeding, and was taken to hospital where he died.

…

Marquel’s family planned to return to the church – where they were regulars – for his funeral, reported the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

“I’m a faith believer, but it’s just hard,” his uncle Garry Peters said. “Why at church?”

Why indeed? Anybody help him out?

Silly man. He’s trying to fathom the will of a supernatural being, which you just can’t do. “My ways are not your ways,” saith the Lord, which is true: I wouldn’t let a child be killed in church. Preventing this wouldn’t have counter-acted anyone’s agency — the shooter likely didn’t intend to kill anyone. But it happened, and a loving god did jack to stop it. Poor little one.

Anyway, since one of the functions of religion is to try to explain things without actually learning anything, I thought I’d try coming up with some reasons that the faithful will inevitably settle on.

1) The boy was playing video games in church, when he clearly should have been listening to the sermon or reading Leviticus. An unchanging god has dealt with him just as he did with the children who mocked Elisha.

Plus he was probably playing Pokémon, which is evil.

2) God did it to show us that it really is possible to be killed by a falling bullet, ending years of speculation from Mythbusters and Cecil Adams. Hallelujah! The Lord is advancing our knowledge! Who says faith and science aren’t compatible? Of course, this god doesn’t seem to have cleared the ethics committee, but a fact’s a fact.

3) Firing bullets into the air is a stupid thing to do, and given enough bullets, one’s going to come down on someone.

There’s one more… what is it… oh, yes.

4) God is imaginary.

I don’t suppose they’ll hit on those last two reasons. They’re a sign of an insufficiently strong testimony, which apparently is considered a bad thing in some parts of the galaxy.