In a struggling post-Soviet community, Lilya a teenage girl is abandoned when her mother moves to the United States with her boyfriend. Facing neglect and poverty, she meets Andrei, who offers her a job in Sweden, giving her hope for a better life — and a journey that will change everything.

The film is based on the memories of Patriarch of All Russia Alexy II about his childhood, about his mother and father-priest, about how he went to Valaam with his parents as a child, about the terrible beginning of the war, which cut off his childhood in an instant, about the arrival of German troops in Estonia... Before the eyes of an 11-year-old boy, there are whole strings of complex human destinies. Being next to his father, little Alyosha saw how sometimes it is unfair for an ordinary provincial priest, sincerely, from the bottom of his heart trying to help the desperate, to keep hope and faith in goodness in them...