watching ppl hurt...

i don't like to watch ppl hurt. I always want to do something about it. a friend of mine tells me that this is how most ppl feel, and that this is why there are very few ppl that can be around me right now. she says that no ones wants to see ppl hurt, and my pain is so intense and consistant right now that ppl don't know what to do with that or how to handle it, so it is easier for them not to be around it at all.
Anyways this post isn't about me hurting, it is about me seeing hurting ppl. this past week my life seems to have been flooded with hurting ppl. All those ppl have been hurting to varying degrees, and have been connected to me in varying ways. I have seen myself handling the hurt in a couple different ways. I either stand back and watch the hurt, completely confused and angry at how 'this' could happen to 'them' or I choose to enter into the hurt with them, with much the same result as just watching but the 'them' changes to 'us'.
I think the hardest part of this is that some of these ppl that I have seen hurting this week didn't just start hurting this week. they have spent a lifetime hurting, and I just have to ask 'why?' I've heard and said all the "right" answers to this question, but it still doesn't make sense to me. why is it that some ppl continue to have painful things happen to them, almost daily, for their entire lives.

All this brings me right back to the place where I ask "if god really was good and all-powerful why would he allow these things?"

so maybe this does have soemthing to do with me, but it isn't just me. and somehow that doesn't make it any easier.