In this article I review some of the more important developments in philosophy of the past fifty years with the aim of pointing out the contribution that the work of Alvin Plantinga has made to these developments. Along the way I also highlight the most important enduring themes in Plantinga’s work.

Most arguments against God’s existence aim to show that it is incompatible with various apparent features of the world, such as the existence of evil or of human free will. In response, theists have sought to show that God’s existence is compatible with these features of the world. However, the fact that the proposition that God exists is necessary if possible introduces some underappreciated difficulties for these arguments.

The concept of faith is central in the philosophy of religion, and the concept of virtue is central in ethics. Both can be clarified by exploring their relationshipswith each other and their connection with conduct, reasons for action, and the good. One important question is whether faith is a virtue. Answering this requires at least a partial account of what constitutes faith and of what makes a characteristic a virtue. The answer also depends on whether we are speaking of religious faith or of faith in general, and on what “content” the faith in question has. This paper approaches the question by contrasting faith with faithfulness, connecting both with trust, and exploring conditions under which each may count as a virtue.

One central claim of orthodox Christianity is that in Jesus of Nazareth, God became man. On Chalcedonian orthodoxy, this involves one person, God the Son, having two natures, divine and human. If He does, one person has two properties, deity and humanity. But the Incarnation also involves concrete objects, God the Son (GS), Jesus’s human body (B) and—I will assume—Jesus’s human soul (S). If God becomes human, GS, B and S somehow become one thing. It would be good to have a metaphysical account of their oneness. I have suggested one. Thomas Senor has criticized my suggestion. I now reply to his case.

Recently Trent Dougherty has claimed that there is a tension between skeptical theism and common sense epistemology—that the more plausible one of these views is, the less plausible the other is. In this paper I explain Dougherty’s argument and develop an account of defeaters which removes the alleged tension between skeptical theism and common sense epistemology.

I defend the position that the appearance of a conflict between common-sense epistemology and skeptical theism remains, even after one fully appreciates the role defeat plays in rational belief. In particular, Matheson’s recent attempt to establish peace is not fully successful.