tough questions.

One of our students recently had a friend ask:

If God loves people unconditionally, then how does God let people go to hell?

Tonight I was reading some of Augustine's stuff for class, and came across a couple interesting lines:

In this world, when the stuff that is considered evil is put in its place as evil, it makes the good look so much better, because good things bring greater pleasure and praise when compared to the bad things. The all-powerful God, who is acknowledged even by non-believers as the Supreme Power in the universe, would not allow any evil in his works, unless God could bring good out of that evil. What is evil except the absence of good?
...Then whatever defects are in a soul are just the absence of a natural good. When that defect is cured, the defect doesn't transfer somewhere else; they cease to exist because good overcame evil. Paraphase from CCEL

My mind doesn't churn very often when I read this kind of stuff, but this did. Maybe it's the real-life application. There's certainly nothing wrong with thinking every now and then...