Every time you check the news lately it seems that God has performed another miracle. Last month, a four-year-old boy survived a seven-storey fall from the balcony of a high-rise building in Miami, landing on a palm tree with little more than a scratch. Within hours the press had dubbed him the "miracle boy" with witnesses declaring that they "saw the hand of God" helping the child.

We have also supposedly seen God's handiwork in a spate of recent airline disasters. First there was the Libyan plane crash and then, just 10 days later, a similar horror in India. In both cases, the survival of one or more passengers was deemed miraculous. In the case of the Mangalore accident, even those who missed the flight cited divine intervention. One of the passengers meant to board the plane said, "I was supposed to go at 1.15am, but by mistake I thought it was 1.15pm . . . it is actually a miracle from God".

Miracles attributed to Mary McKillop may just be good luck. Credit:Steven Siewert

All this talk of miracles tends to lead religion into dangerous territory. For me, "miracles" are just a reminder of a problem inherent in religious logic. If we are to believe that God really did intervene to save these people from an early death, what does this say about those who die? Presumably God does not care enough to save them from the terror and pain of an accidental death or to spare their families a lifetime of grief. We can also reasonably ask why, if God is all-powerful and all-loving, he doesn't prevent plane crashes and balcony falls in the first place?

The response offered up by religion is the baffling claim that God works in mysterious ways, or has a "higher plan", which we are not qualified – or even permitted – to inquire after. I prefer American biology professor and renowned internet blogger P.Z. Myers' recent response that such events can only be interpreted as proof that "God is a capricious bastard".