A nation already in mourning after the Humboldt bus tragedy is left reeling again after the attacks in Toronto. And many may be asking, "Where is God?"

It's a difficult question to answer for many Christians. We asked pastors for their take on that question.

Chris Marchand - Niverville Community Fellowship

"That's one of the hardest questions that people ever put to Christians, or Christians put to each other, and I'll answer it that God is in the same place that God has always been. God is most greatly, I think, experienced even in the midst of suffering and pain, and God doesn't change His character or His location. God is with us, and the scripture teaches us very cleary that God is with us in our pain.

"Psalm 34:18 says that God is close to the brokenhearted. The problem with being the brokenhearted is that we often don't feel God in those times of pain, and so sometimes God can feel very distant, and that can feel awful. But I think, when I read Psalm 34, I'm reminded that God reaches for us when we're brokenhearted. We don't always have to reach for Him. Sometimes we're just so numbed by the pain that we can't even recognize that God is reaching for us.

"God is in the pain, and God reaches for us, even when our hearts are broken."

Moses Falco - Sterling Mennonite Church

"That is a big question, and as big as a question it is, it's also an important question. Sometimes we think that the church is supposed to have answers for all the things in life that seem unexplainable, but sometimes I think there's space for us to say we don't know why some things happen. There is no good explanation or good reasoning as to some of the tragedies we experience or that we see around the world, and to kind of give an artificial answer of 'this all happened for a reason' doesn't seem to fit the deep hurt that people experience. And I don't mean that good things can't happen out of bad situations; sometimes we just need to look at a situation and say 'that's horrible!' and we're going to experience pain, and we're going to experience grief, and we're going to need to find a way to get through that as a community.

"What would I tell someone who's saying 'where's God in this?' One of the things I would probably say is that I ask those questions myself. Especially with Humboldt, and now in Toronto, too. How does something like that happen? And I think we find, too, in scripture, a lot of places where people as well ask God 'where are you?' Passages in the Psalms of Israel asking God where God is when they're in exile, for example. I think passages like that at least give us license to grieve, and to mourn, and to lament.

"So that's where I go when I think of Humboldt, and I think of Toronto and those kinds of tragedies. I think we need space to lament as a community, and as we try to work through that, and even come to a place of saying 'okay, we don't understand why this happened, it wasn't a good thing, it wasn't God's intention, but can we trust that God is still with us, even in the darkness?' That's where trust and faith come in, and that's where we find hope, I think. When a bad situation is there, we say 'that's horrible, but can we find God, and can we know that God is with us still, even though we walk through this uncertainty.'"

Andrew Bawa - NextGen Worship Centre

"God is there. That's a very tough question for any pastor to answer, and I've faced that question several times when there've been tragedies. 'Why didn't God show up?' God has always been there, but we as human beings have run away from God, and everything has its consequences as long as we keep running from the arms of God.

"God's design is that 'I will be with you always.' The presence of tragedy is not the absence of God. It's just that God has given us the free will to make a choice, and God does not come to try and stop us. Look at what the Bible says, 'even the heavens belong to God, but the earth has been given to man.' All he needs is for us to be able to pray, and make sure He comes to intervene. So I will say, maybe for us as Christians, we need to pray more. If I'm being honest, I think this is the time to break down the wall of denominationalism; we should come together to pray... God is always there. If Christians can come together and unite and pray, there is power in prayer. And I think the question is not 'where is God?' but 'where are the Christians?'"

Bruce Jones - Willowdale Baptist Church

"The first thing that I would say in response to 'where is God in this?' is that I cannot give a trite answer to that. There is no pat answer that ties it all up in a bow, and that will take away everyone's questions. All of us ask those 'why?' questions, 'why do these things happen?,' and sometimes the question is 'why would a loving God allow such a thing to happen?' But in those opportunities as the Lord gives me the opportunity to speak to someone, I want to encourage them and help them realize that even though bad things happen, even though difficult things happen in this word, ultimately if the opportunity comes I want to tell them that it's because of sin in the world, and and that God in His love and grace for us sent his son Jesus Christ to deal with our sin if we would simply and only trust and put our faith in Him and ask Him for His forgiveness. He will deal with our sin and He will give us eternal life, and he will give us that opportunity to know Him personally.

"I think there's a lot of encouragement in the scriptures, too. Psalm 42:11, 'why are you downcast, oh my soul? Why so disturbed within me? Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise Him, my saviour, my God.' Ultimately, just helping people realize there's a lot of bad in the world but there is a soverign God who loves and wants to have a relationship with you."

Bishop Kevin Robertson - Toronto, ON

"I think that question, 'where is God?' is held up right alongside 'why do bad things happen to good people?' and 'why do good things happen to bad people?' I see God in all kinds of places in this. It's terrible that ten people lost their lives, and we're never going to get those lives back, and the family members and friends aren't, but I see and hear and witness the incredible outpouring of love. And I know people across the country like to make fun of Toronto, as this big, impersonal, cold place. Hey, I live in Toronto, I know it can be like that! But yesterday, I thought 'I am really proud to be a Torontonian,' because I see the love of God. Not everybody, of course, would name it as the love of God, but I do. I see the love of God being shared in ways that probably would not have happened in different circumstances.

"That's not to justify what happened, or minimize it at all. When terrible things happen, God has a way of coming in and getting through, and as terrible as this is, it doesn't rock my faith. I look at it and say 'look, everybody knows what suffering is like, everybody knows adversity. But what does it look like to model love and being a good neighbor in the midst of that adversity, and I think we saw some of that modelled [in the Toronto tragedy]."