@Isabel Hu It seems like your argument would actually be as follows:
1. God created humans with free will
2. If free will is inherently good, then evil cannot exist
3. Evil does exist
4. Therefore, humans and/or free will aren’t inherently good

In this argument, free will is defined as the lack of God’s intervention. If humans are inherently good, then they wouldn’t need God to direct them to do God. Since Adam and Eve were given free will and chose to eat the apple, it follows that free will is not inherently good.

My argument is based on the fact that God is inherently good and that Evil exists. When God gave humans free will, He gave humans the ability to make decisions free of God’s direction. When God stepped back, Evil stepped in.

St.Augustine suggested that evil is the absence of good and that once good returns the evil disappears — david plumb

If what St. Augustine suggested was true, then the opposite must be true as well. Good is the absence of good and that once evil returns the evil disappears. It seems like it is one or the other. Thus, once humans were free from God’s goodness, evil was allowed to enter. However, I don’t believe that any one human can be entirely good or evil. When Jesus came to Earth, He was both fully God and fully human. As a human, Jesus was born on Earth with his own free will but he denies that free will for the will of God (Luke 22:42)

Father, if it is Your will, take this cup away from Me; nevertheless not My will, but Yours, be done. — Luke 22:42

But also, like @”TheMadFool” said, if humans are inherently good or bad then it is already determined. Humans then aren’t free to be good or bad. So, free will can’t be inherently good or bad. I suggest that free will has no inherent good or bad but rather the choice of good or bad. I would argue that God gave humans the choice of good or bad, and there was no inherency of either.

And so, to this argument I say, God did create humans with free will but free will is not inherently good or bad. And since Evil does exist, free will is definitely not inherently good. But no human can be fully good or evil because of free will.

P1) Purgatory exists and is a place where the soul is refined before entering heaven.
P2) If purgatory exists and God is omnipotent, then he desires to, and can, refine souls after death.
P3) If he desires to, and can, refine souls after death, then he could/would do this immediately after death.
P4) Purgatory, as most popularly understood, is not an immediate process after death — DPKING

First off, what would you define Purgatory as? As P1 states, Purgatory is the step before heaven. If a soul is refined enough, it goes directly to heaven. But if the soul is not refined enough, it stops at Purgatory where it can be further refined. Once the soul is refined, then it can enter heaven. What happens in Purgatory that refines the soul? Is Purgatory the waiting room before God decides where a soul goes? That would mean that nothing happens to the soul while waiting and it is just sat there, marinating or proving like dough before a bake. Or is Purgatory a center where the soul is processed and developed before God decides the soul’s fate? Like kneading and reshaping dough before the bake. In that case, the soul changes while in Purgatory.

Next, I will challenge P3, that God could/would refine the soul immediately after death. If God could refine a soul immediately after death, what’s the point of Purgatory? If God can immediately refine the soul, then it should go to either Heaven or Hell straight after death. If God has the power to decide where the soul goes, then Purgatory is an unnecessary stop between the two options. If the soul is destined for heaven but still needs to be refined a bit, why can’t it refine while in heaven?

It seems like this Free Will thing really, really matters to God. In order for Purgatory to do its thing and it not be a robot factory that wipes your mind and gives you the one that God thinks you should have, it seems like God has to allow you to take up the challenge yourself. — DPKING

What can you do in Purgatory that you could not do on Earth? Purgatory is starting to sound like a second chance. It’s sounding like a place where God gives us the last chance to choose how our soul will end up.

God chooses not to force our hands, nor make transformation a quick process, because we fail to really change with these methods of instruction. — DPKING

Since God does not want to force His hand because of Free Will, then something must be happening in Purgatory that He does not touch. Is He allowing the soul to continue playing out? Is it a second life for the soul or a last chance? Is Purgatory just a pre-Heaven or pre-Hell then?

Moreover, it seems to be very likely that God actually intends to put evil in the world as an intermediary to strengthen people’s faith and ultimately align with goodness — Isabel Hu

I agree with your objection to premise 1c. It’s not that God cannot eliminate evil, but more like it is a necessary evil in his ultimate plan. This sounds like the Soul-Making Theodicy, in which God allows evil and suffering in order to develop humans into virtuous creatures capable of following his will; trials to make souls holy. This can be supported by the Temptation of Christ (Luke 4:1-13). Satan tries to tempt Jesus as he walks through the wilderness. Jesus successfully resists temptation and that further developed him as the perfect lamb. As the Bible says, the perfect lamb was born to die on the cross for all of humanity’s sins. Jesus had to go through many trials to show that he was tempted as we are and then how he was able to overcome those trials. Those trials strengthened and elevated Jesus’ soul.

he somehow intentionally puts evil in the world and considers it as a method to strengthen people’s faith and guide them to ultimate goodness — Isabel Hu

In this sense, I believe the Problem of Evil exists, just not in the way you’d think. The Problem of Evil argument implies that it’s God’s problem with evil. And since evil exists, that must mean God can’t solve the problem. The Problem of Evil that I propose is that it is mankind’s problem with evil. Evil is the problem that mankind must solve. God purposely places evil in our way so that we must come up with a way to overcome it. Evil is a piece in God’s plan.

A response to this Soul-Making Theodicy is that some people die before they are made holy by God’s trials. To that I say, free will. People are free to do as they please because of free will and that is why some people fail to make their soul holy. And people who fail soul-making, their failures can affect other people’s lives. Others’ free will becomes an obstacle that some people cannot overcome.