Interesting! U.S. forms of Evangelical Christianity don't emphasize suffering quite like that, at least not anymore. At one time, and in living memory, it wasn't unusual for American Protestant Christians to hear from the pulpit that suffering was an important part of the Christian experience, that they should bear suffering on Earth in order to attain eternal reward. In fact, that message was one reason slave owners were at one time so anxious that enslaved people adopt Christianity.

Today, much of the Evangelical world here seems to have lurched toward a sort of "Prosperity Gospel" that offers earthly rewards like wealth and luxurious possessions in return for Christian faithfulness.

Speaking of enslaved people being encouraged to accept their fate, something similar can be observed about the Roman Catholic Church in North America, where at least in Quebec, Catholic priest and bishops are said to have encouraged French-speaking people up to and through the 1960s to accept their subordinate status in society for religious reasons, accepting suffering in return for eternal spiritual reward.

I don't think the theological arguments were exactly like the ones American evangelicals used about enslaved people, and they were a bit different from what you're describing about Romanian Orthodox thinking.

But there is a common thread: encouraging people to believe that some supernatural force has more of a hand in their success or suffering than their own choices and actions.

Religion is least valuable and most harmful, I think, when it encourages or elevates superstitious mysticism over the fullness of human potential.