How to sincerely love God, who called us without asking into a world where there is so much pain and sufferingtranslated

Sometimes truly exceptional letters arrive in the Foma editorial mailbox. Their sender does not ask us some particular theological question, but offers a systemic analysis of the Christian worldview, after reading which, it seems, the Orthodox can only throw up their hands, or better yet, raise their hands and say: “We give up! We have been deceiving ourselves and deceiving others for centuries!” We write without sarcasm: the author of the letter, the text of which we will now present, really seriously, without “hysterics and provocations,” approached the analysis of “sick” theological issues. And therefore we will answer him just as seriously and thoroughly.

A letter from a reader with some abbreviations that do not affect its essence and were made due to limitations in the volume of the publication:

God chooses to exist a world in which the possibility of pain is initially built into ontology*, and this pain can be undeserved, disproportionate and even eternal. A person does not choose either the fact of his existence or the conditions in which his freedom will be realized. Freedom appears within a system where the risk of suffering is given in advance - before any choice.

What is ontology? Ontology (from the Greek ὄντος - existing) is the doctrine of being,...