Your answer, Nutty, is that God doesn't write the script. God doesn't allow or create evil - it just happens, usually because somebody decides to do it. Otherwise, we'd all be mere marionettes.

As for the bit about "administering rules" and such, I think it's important for people to look at religious organizations in a new way:

The "administration" exists to serve the members, not to direct them.

Now, I realize that it's very difficult for administrative people to act like they're serving the people they're supposed to be serving, but that anomaly exists in all facets of life. It's up to us not to allow ourselves to be directed by those who are supposed to be serving us. I've always thought that it's my church, just as much as it is the Pope's. If the Pope doesn't like it, that doesn't particularly bother me.

Many people in the Catholic Church have finally begun to realize that their membership is voluntary, and their cooperation with management is also voluntary, and their financial contributions are voluntary. The thread of hellfire means very little to modern Catholics. That realization can make all the difference in the world. Oh, and for a long, long time, it has said in the books that the Pope and bishops are supposed to discern the sensus fidelium, the commonly-held beliefs of the faithful - religious teaching is not supposed to be dictated from the top down.

-Joe-