Why are there earthquakes?

In light of the recent disaster of the earthquake in Nepal, devastating cities and destroying vast areas, killing thousands of people and wrecking tamples and reducing ancient World Heritage sites to dust. There's been tons of casualties and there are people still being rescued. It's been the largest earthquake recorded there and the first earthquake within that zone for almost a century. Unfortunately, disasters happen and will always likely to happen again. There are always going to be natural disasters and man-made disasters. There will always be such powerful earthquakes, storms, floods and volcanoes. But everyone keeps asking why. The most common question people ask is why should this happen? They seek answers from "God" and they wonder why there is so much suffering in the world. Pagans also ask the Goddess/gods/spirits why there is so much tragedy and so much anger in the world. Maybe I can find out.

I will use a special technique that some people refer to as "channelling". I will pose a few obvious questions and then get some feedback from a divine answer. Please don't be offended by this. My questions are the following:

1. Why is there so much disasters?
2. How can there be so much pain, death and suffering?
3. Humans were blessed with intelligence and yet punished this way, why?
4. What can be done to stop this?

I ask the gods if they can share some insight. I understand not everyone will believe in gods, spirits or ghosts and will not take this too seriously and won't be interested. This is really no problem and I don't mind if people will laugh and scoff. Here are the replies from the gods:

1. "The world that you live upon is by nature full of life. It is constantly moving. It breathes. It reflexes. When lands shift, it makes a shock wave effect and can cause a massive earthquake, and it is not avoidable. The earth's history is full of earthquakes. The earth's beginning was far more hostile than it is now."

2. "You ask how can there be so much pain and death. There has always been pain and death. It is not deliberate. Pain is a reaction from a severe cut. There is pain and there is joy. Pain comes in many forms. Death is not about a purposeful end as it is a change of existence. Suffering itself is part of living on a world that is very physically active."

3. "Humans were not so much "blessed" but are gifted with the ability to learn, create and invent. There are other intelligent species. Humans are simply a product of time and journey of the earth's history made to endure life and produce something highly advanced and give protection to the ageing earth's vulnerabilities."

4. "The problem with stopping disasters and earthquakes is that the world would have to stop moving and then the world will become uninhabitable, barren and open for cosmic attacks from showers and radiation storms. To understand the world, understand the planet itself as if it were a living human. Also humans lost the ability to predict earthquakes when humans were able to farm."

Thank you.

(The image used on this post is of an elephant statue among the debris in Nepal).
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