Alvin Plantinga is the most influential figure in recent philosophy of religion. He is often credited with having restored the respectability of theism among mainstream analytic philosophers. Although coming from a Calvinist tradition, he now teaches at Notre Dame.Plantinga here claims that it's fully rational to accept the existence of God as a "properly basic belief" -- one that needs no argument on its behalf. This is the key idea behind the "reformed epistemology" approach to religious knowledge.
This exercise deals with a reading from Plantinga in our anthology (pages 329-41 of Philosophy of Religion: Selected Readings (second edition), edited by Peterson, Hasker, Reichenbach, and Basinger). These computerized exercise materials are copyrighted (c) 2002 by Harry J. Gensler; but they may be distributed freely.