Ted Turner is no stranger to loss. He lost his marriage, then his media empire last year. But nothing could prepare him for the loss of his two-year-old granddaughter, Maddox Garlington, who died suddenly of a rare hereditary disease two weeks ago. As Mr Turner flies to Australia in the next couple of days - for the latest, and possibly last, of his Goodwill Games - there seems to be no end to his grief. His colleagues say the death of Maddox has left the 63-year-old tycoon "virtually inconsolable". She was the youngest daughter of his youngest daughter, Jennie Garlington. Maddox suffered from Hurler syndrome, an enzyme deficiency that can cause severe mental retardation, facial distortion and serious defects in internal organs and bones. Doctors have had limited success with bone marrow transplants, but there is no known cure. Sufferers normally die before their teens. Just a few months ago Mr Turner learned that another of his grandchildren had been diagnosed with the same disorder. The syndrome, commonly referred to as gargoylism because of the facial abnormalities it can cause, occurs when an inherited genetic abnormality is passed on by both parents. Mr Turner has spent the past two weeks at his daughter's side. He has cancelled all business appointments leading up to the Goodwill Games, which begin in Brisbane on Wednesday, and does not intend to make any public appearances until a brief news conference on opening day."You will have to excuse him if he is not his usual exuberant self when he gets to Australia," one of his colleagues said this week. "We can only imagine the pain his family is going through." Mr Turner learned of Maddox's illness last year, amid all the confusion of the AOL-Time Warner merger and the emotional strain of his divorce. He said in an interview with The New Yorker magazine in April that his life had hit rock bottom at that time, taking him to the brink of suicide. "I felt like Job," he said. Mr Turner had been shattered as he watched his media empire slip from his grasp in the wake of the AOL-Time Warner mega-merger. His news and movie networks were consumed by the multi-media monolith. But it was just business, after all. Mr Turner had rolled enough people in his time to know it could one day happen to him. Just a few months before, he had dealt with a loss of a more personal nature, when his marriage to the actress Jane Fonda collapsed. Again, he had found a way of coming to terms with his pain. Partners grow apart; marriages break down; it is unfortunate, but it happens. The death of Maddox, though, has had a profound affect on the hard-edged Southern tycoon. It is not the first time Mr Turner has lost someone close to him. He nursed his younger sister to a slow and painful death from an immune system disease when he was a teenager. He had planned to become a missionary, but turned his back on religion after her death. "I couldn't understand how someone so innocent should be made or allowed to suffer so," he said in the New Yorker interview. Mr Turner has incited the ire of the US religious right since, describing Christianity as "a religion for losers" and asking Catholics at CNN whether they were "Jesus freaks" when they arrived for work on Ash Wednesday with crosses on their foreheads. Those around Mr Turner say the past year has changed him, dousing some of his fire and making him less confrontational. Friends note his shoulders slope more, his hair has turned white and his hearing is failing. Since effectively losing control of his company, he has devoted much of his time to the many philanthropic pursuits of his Turner Foundation. And he has set up the Maddox Garlington Memorial Fund for research into Hurler syndrome. His search for a cure entails potent sense of purpose - the life of his second grandchild with the disease.

Here we are back at the same old stuff. We keep going over this. I just read about Ted Turner and I hurt for him. Many people probably don't care about whether he hurts but he hurts because, in part, he does not understand. You have given me answers but either I have not understood or something is missing. I still want more of an answer about why there is pain and suffering.
O.K., let me try to explain it this way. When things were created, I gave Lucifer and all the other angels free will. From Ted Turner's perspective, and really from your perspective, that was a mistake. From your perspective, that idea of giving every spiritual creature (including human beings) freedom of choice was a mistake. However, giving freedom to spiritual beings was not a mistake from my perspective. Lucifer had the power to make choices and decisions. He chose to turn away from me. At the instant he turned away, hell came into existence. The instant he turned away, every kind of hellish suffering by human beings came into existence. Let's back up and redo creation, so to speak, for just a second. Let's take back free will. Let's make every spiritual being void of freedom of thought and freedom of choice. What do we have? We have plants. We have plants that can move about, eat, sleep, and reproduce. When someone is comatose from a stroke or accident you call them a vegetable. With no free will, with no freedom of thought there is nothing. No art, no music, no literature, no invention, no creative spirit, no development of any kind on any level. When there is no freedom there is no sin and there is no righteousness. I know you understand the intellectual concept. I know you don't like the answer on an emotional level. There will always be the perception by some people that I am an imperfect God doing bad things to people. This perception enables people to run away from committing their life to me. Who would want to give their life to a person who does bad things to human beings? No one.

I love you back Lord.