I will keep this very brief:
Suffering is not intrinsically evil.
God can draw good from suffering. (Example: An act of love made in suffering receives an eternal reward.)
Only if there is an objective, universal standard of moral goodness, do Stephen Fry’s arguments make any shred of sense.
Below is a beautiful revelation (given to St. Mary Magdalen of Pazzi by God the Father), which relates directly to the question of why God would permit suffering:
"If Adam had never sinned, and if the Word never died for you, you would still have enjoyed eternal bliss, but in a more restricted way. You would have partly merited the reward which I should have given you, but your merits would have been much less, and the saints would not have received the crowns which now shine upon their heads.
They could not have gained the crown of martyrdom, for want of persecutors, or that of virginity for lack of concupiscence.
The Church would not have had her Doctors to teach truth and fight error, since ignorance and bad faith would not have existed among men.
Finally, your glory would have been far less, for you would not have had to fight against yourselves and against the world; it would have been very easy for you to observe My commandments, because you would not have had any evil inclinations within you.
In a word, there would have been between the glory that I would have given you then and the glory that I will give you now the same difference as there is between a soul which is adorned by the Precious Blood of My Son and one which is not. Oh, how great is the glory I give you now, My daughter! Oh, how immensely the Blood of My Word has increased the torrent of the joys of Paradise!"
While Our Lady did not have had to fight these evil inclinations, her merits are still immense owing to the immense suffering she endured for the love of souls.
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