DiNoia concentrates primarily on the logic, as distinct from the history or development, of various religious doctrines. Most of his examples compare and contrast Christianity with Buddhism, but he also makes frequent reference to Judaism, Islam, and Hinduism. In its baldest form, the problem he deals with is the problem of how a given religion can recognize the claims of other religions while still asserting the truth of its own central beliefs. Typically, this amounts to the idea that salvation requires explicit faith in Christ prior to death. Inclusivists hold that all religions implicitly aim at the salvation that Christianity proclaims, even though their adherents may be unaware of the fact.
Pluralists go one step further.
They hold that all religious communities aim at transcendence of some sort, but that the nature of this transcendence is essentially ineffable. Particular religions, the pluralists claim, are by their very nature inadequate, culture-bound attempts to conceptualize something beyond conceptualization. The inclusivist option has a long history, going back to some church fathers. Nicholas of Cusa's De pace fidei , written soon after the fall of Constantinople in 1453, is a classic example of the genre. The pluralist option also has a long history, and it has become especially popular in recent decades as many theologians have come to fear nothing more than the accusation of being narrow-minded.