Unknown. But, in the end, if we admit that there really is some mysterious content behind these words, you still simply believe in it, you do not prove it.

Confessor. I do not prove it logically. But I feel their truth not only with my immediate feeling, but also with my mind, because these stories explain to me the inexplicable and bring all the chaos into a harmonious and perfect world view.

Unknown. Well, you won't talk about a "perfect worldview" for a while. Listen first to my main objections. For so far I have spoken rather of external obstacles to faith. Now I will move on to the internal ones.

Confessor. Well done.

Unknown. How many times have I asked myself the question of God: suppose this incomprehensible God exists. Suppose I managed to violate common sense and forced myself to recognize an invisible, incomprehensible personal God. Can I rest on this confession? After all, reason will demand from me answers to a number of questions that will follow from this recognition. The first and most damning question will be about evil. Suppose I believe that there is an omnipotent, omnipresent, omniscient God, who created everything and "without Him there was nothing, if there was." Where does evil come from? What is it? Who created it? Also God? Obviously not. And if God did not create, does it mean that not everything was created by God? And why does the almighty God tolerate evil, if it was not created by Him? Why should this whole tragicomedy of the "struggle against evil" be played out, when the almighty God could destroy it with a single movement and leave only good in the world? What answer can faith give to these questions? To reduce everything to incomprehensibility again? An ordinary refuge when unsolvable questions are asked to believers. But in this case, the insolubility of the question of evil should lead us not to the recognition of the "incomprehensibility" of religious truths, but to the inevitable denial of God, because the existence of evil makes belief in God absurd.

The second, no less deadly question is about suffering. By your definition, God is love. Absolute, perfect, incomprehensible, and so on. And this love allows not only man to suffer, but also everything living on earth, to suffer immeasurable suffering, down to the very last ciliate. Even our hardened heart feels sorry for the sufferer. And it is God, love itself, who sees and hears how the earth groans, and does not want to stop its suffering. After all, God is almighty, so He can give happiness to all living things? What is the point of God silently "watching" as the world writhes in pain? And there is also a higher, "incomprehensible meaning" in this? You will say that God is not to blame for these sufferings, they are for sin in paradise? Well done. But, first, why did God create man in such a way that he sinned? And secondly, the fruit from the forbidden tree was eaten by man, what does the ciliate have to do with it? After all, she did not violate any commandment, but it hurts her if she is put in some kind of acid!

You like to say that you see God in nature. What is this? Blindness or self-deception? After all, from the point of view of the "higher truth", nature is sheer horror. Where is God? Everything eats each other there. A beetle eats a worm, a bird eats a beetle, a kite eats a bird. A frog swallows a mosquito larva, a snake swallows a frog, a hedgehog eats a snake, a fox eats a hedgehog. And all this is God in nature? Or maybe you see God in tricks like a rider piercing a caterpillar? A man would not have thought of such a monstrous cruelty. Pierce the caterpillar, put an egg in it, from which a larva will hatch, which will eat the entrails of the caterpillar and, when it does pupate, will hatch instead of it. Is all this God? Yes? You will say: this is "the result of sin." Well done. But God is omniscient. So He knew that there would be such a "result" -- why then create the world? Again you will say: "mystery", incomprehensible, inexpressible. But wait, that's not all.

You, who acknowledge God, with all His "absolute" attributes, further assert that this God-love of the miserable, unfortunate, suffering man, when he finally finds rest in death, will send him for his sins to hell, where this unfortunate criminal will suffer forever -- "there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth." There was not enough weeping and gnashing of teeth here on earth, it turns out that the all-loving Lord has prepared even greater torments in the next world for eternity. What nonsense! What a horror! And yet I must believe! Never! If, with a certain stretch, I can still admit the existence of both an incomprehensible and an "invisible" God, then when I ask myself the question of evil and suffering, I feel that belief in God is simply absurd nonsense.

Confessor. Everything you have just said is really "deadly" questions, but not for believers in God, as you think, but on the contrary, for those who do not believe in Him. And I am very glad that you have posed these questions so clearly and firmly, for there is no other way out of them than faith.

Unknown. It's great. Do you want to turn my weapon against me? Let's see how you do it.

Confessor. I will try to reveal to you how faith answers your murderous questions, and then you will see how helpless unbelief is before these questions.

Unknown. I only hope that you will dispense with references to the Church Fathers and other authorities.

Confessor. You have probably noticed that in conversations with you I avoid such references, although I always have in mind both the Word of God and the works of the Church Fathers. But in this regard, perhaps, I will quote the words of the Holy Fathers, not because I consider them an authority for you, but because they express with such perfection what is almost inexpressible in human words.

Unknown. However, since you give me complete freedom to speak as I see fit, I should not constrain you in this regard. I'm listening.