Ivan:
Tell me, then—what use is this freedom you so exalt, if it can be twisted into chains for the innocent? Children suffer, and you say it is permitted for the sake of some grand design. But what child ever consented to be the price of mankind’s liberty?

Theologian:
I will not tell you their tears are part of “God’s plan” as though the suffering itself were necessary. That would be obscene. Their suffering is real, unjust, and stands as accusation against the world. But freedom—true freedom—must be capable of terrible misuse, or it is no freedom at all.

Ivan:
Then God is guilty for giving such a poisoned gift. If freedom leads to Auschwitz, to the torn body of one innocent child, I return the ticket.

Theologian:
And yet your refusal—your cry of indignation—already acknowledges the standard by which you judge God. You expect goodness, you demand mercy. Where did such a demand come from, if not from the very image of God etched into the conscience?

Ivan:
Conscience, perhaps. But it accuses God as much as man. What is the worth of an eternal harmony purchased with the screams of even one child?

Theologian:
None, if harmony means mere compensation, a balancing of accounts. The gospel does not promise that evil will be explained or justified as if it were a piece of a puzzle. It promises that evil will be judged, exposed, and finally transfigured by love stronger than death.

Ivan:
Fine words. But while we wait for this transfiguration, children suffer still. Where is your God when they cry?

Theologian:
On the cross. That is the only place I dare point. God does not watch from afar; He enters into that suffering, bears it, and makes it His own. It does not cancel the scandal—it deepens it—but it also says that no tear falls outside His wounds.

Ivan:
So the answer is more suffering—God’s this time? That hardly satisfies me.

Theologian:
Nor should it satisfy. Faith does not remove the scandal; it carries it. To believe is not to explain away the horror, but to live in defiance of it, trusting that the God who shared our agony will not let agony have the last word.

Ivan:
Then perhaps unbelief is the more honest path—refusal, revolt, rejection of such a God.

Theologian:
Even in revolt, you wrestle with the Christian God, not some abstract deity. Your rebellion is the shadow of faith; your “no” presupposes His “yes.” The very vehemence of your protest honors the goodness you deny.

Ivan:
Or perhaps it only proves the wound is too deep to heal.

Theologian:
Or that the wound cries out for healing so profound it must come from beyond us. That is why I hope, even while I cannot explain.

Ivan (bursting out):
You theologians come with your formulas, your immovable God who suffers nothing, who stands above all tragedy like some cold star. But tell me—when the child is torn by dogs, when the soldier laughs and the mother screams—do you dare tell her this is for freedom? For some grand transfiguration? Bah! If that is heaven, I return the ticket!

Theologian (calmly, almost tenderly):
You think me a fool if I speak of freedom. Yet freedom is no abstraction, Ivan Fyodorovich. It is as terrible as it is glorious. Have you heard the story of the master who gave his servant a key to the house? The servant could lock himself in forever, or open the door and flee into the night. The master gave it, knowing he might never see his servant again, but preferring the risk of absence to the certainty of slavery. God has given us such a key, and He will not take it back.

Ivan (with bitter irony):
A pretty parable! But what of the child who never asked for the key? Whose bones are crushed under the wheel before he can even turn the lock? You theologians speak as though children are born with full freedom, when in truth they are born only to suffer for the sins of their fathers. No harmony, no golden Jerusalem is worth a single child’s tear. You tell me of keys and houses. I tell you of basements, dark cellars where the innocent scream. And your God? He builds His heaven on their cries.

Theologian (pausing, then slowly):
I will not deny it is a scandal. To deny it would be to mock the very victims. But what if God Himself has entered the cellar? Not as master, but as the condemned. Have you not considered, Ivan, that the cross is God’s descent into that very darkness?

Ivan (with a sharp laugh):
Ah yes, the cross. Always the cross! Another child nailed up to save the rest—except this one is divine, so we must all be satisfied. But what if I do not want salvation through blood, even divine blood? What if I reject the very economy of suffering? I want innocence unbought, joy unearned, life without payment!

Theologian (softly):
And yet you cannot escape the payment. Even your rebellion is paid for in anguish. You reject the ticket, but you cannot unhear the music. You wish for innocence, but you know of it only because you have seen it profaned. Even your revolt confesses the goodness it denies.

Ivan:
Why must the conscience accuse me of believing even as I deny? Why must my refusal sound like prayer? If your God exists, He has made me His enemy without my consent. Tell me, priest, is not rebellion also a kind of communion?

Theologian (after a long silence):
Perhaps it is. Judas too was given bread from the same hand. And even he could not escape the love that chose him.

Ivan:
You want me to kneel. But I will not. Not while the children cry. Not while the world bleeds. If your Christ waits for me, He must wait forever.

Theologian:
He will wait, Ivan. He waits in every child, in every cry, in every restless night of your mind. He waits not above you, but within the very revolt that tears at you now. And when you curse Him, you speak His name.