ABSTRACT
In the pluralist society in which we live, religious belief is threatened by a large variety of alternative sources of inspiration, both religious and secular. These are what the religious believer would call ‘temptations.’ The main consideration that prevents religious believers from being satisfied with human recognition is connected with the limitations that human finitude places on the nature and extent of this recognition. Apart from God’s perfect knowledge of each of us, it is also his immutability that, for believers, makes divine recognition the only dependable anchor for our personal identity. If lovers and friends respond to changing circumstances in ways that are incompatible, they will grow apart. For religious believers the connection is crucial since for them their identity as persons ultimately transcends every consensus that they might reach with other people.
