It's something I have often wondered, how can God (Tao, insert term) be good if there is so much bad in the world?

And to me the answer lies in freedom. I believe that we (more or less) have free will, at least within the confines of our existence the choices, decision, reactions, interpretations we partake in 'create' reality.

I would rather live in a free (again more or less) universe that has pain and chaos than a universe that restricts my choices, no matter how 'good' for me the outcome is.

I don't believe in having faith personally, but my trust based on what I have experienced has lead me to believe that God's love is rather different than human love. Human love comes with expectations (I love you... so long as you don't cheat me, I love you... so long as your not a serial killer, etc.), whereas (and of course I cannot speak for the Universe or any Deity definitively, this is just my interpretation) God love's in non-attached way. The sun shines and the rain falls just as much for rapists as it does for me, not because God is cruel, but because God loves in a way that transcends human problems.

I personally believe our Essences (High Selves, insert term) incarnate to experience. Some lives the personalities will be murdered, some lives we will probably turn it around and murder others. I think the problem is that there is no good or bad in the universe, there is positive and negative, things that are constructive, things that we perceive as pleasant or unpleasant, but there is no judge. We are here to do whatever we want, we are under no obligation. And that to me is the most profoundly loving thing, there is nobody accept our individual Essences keeping score, there is no set path.

I'm not sure if I am describing it very well, but my point is that our freedom entails responsibility. Everything up until our first breathe is decided for us and everything (that does not produce karma) that comes after that first breathe is up to us. It also offers beauty.

And for the record, I am not belittling the suffering of others. Yes some things hurt, yes we can work together to help alleviate the instances of social problems. But, I think from the perspective of my Higher Self the instances of pain are worth incarnating in the end.