Evil . . . is not explainable. It is not even understandable. It is . . . "the great absurdity, the great irrelevancy."
It is absurd in the sense that disease is absurd — a tumor in the brain can turn a genius into a vegetable; a chemical imbalance can turn the gentlest of creatures into a raving maniac. It is irrelevant in the sense that, like the Black Death in the Middle Ages or AIDS in our time, it conforms to no logic that we can grasp or rely upon.
— Morris West, A View from the Ridge