摘要：The aim of this paper is to consider how well equipped philosophy is to meet the logical and epistemological demands of religious belief. That this belief is a response to questions both practical and urgent ¨C the nature of one's existence, the reality of salvation ¨C frequently seems quite unimportant in a field dominated by rationalism and theistical realism. To properly understand both the response and the questions that give rise to it, I want to return to the foundations of religious thought. These fo undations, I suggest, are not found in pure intuitions of divine reality, or in objective perceptions of divine handiwork. Religious thought begins with religious education. That is where we will find t he conceptual tools to make sense of talk about God. Mo re importantly, perhaps, that is where we will find a criterion of kno wledge. Education embodies the creative involvement of one mind in the development of another. The philosophical import of this is two-fold. First, it provides a model for conceiving Creation and the Agent of Creation. This resolves the conflict between classical and neo -classical ontologies, offers instead a chastened transcendence: otherness without isolation, involvement without equiprimordiality. Seco nd, it instantiates providence in action, God at work in the believer's life. Our criterion of kno wledge, then, is a matter of impact: the 'experiencable difference' providence makes to the believer's life. Together, model and instance underpin a realignment of praxis and theoria. Religious praxis stands upon its claim to truth; without praxis embodied by the connection o f developing minds, truth cannot be ascertained
