That reads to me like you can make two checks if you have both skills.
I read it the opposite way.
Taking the OP literally, he said "a DC 12 Knowledge (religion or local) check". Parsing that down to just the first and last word, it's "a check". That's the key right there, "a check". Singular.
Rearranging the words a little, I read it as "a DC12 check that can be made using Knowledge (religion or local)". So pick your best one and make "a check".
Justifiable because nobody ever learns things in a vacuum; our brains are not compartmentalized like that. A computer might, not a person. Put another way, making two separate checks is like this:
Your car breaks down. Knowing something about auto mechanics, you attempt to figure out what is wrong with it so you run though what you think might be the possible causes using all your auto mechanics knowledge, but in the end, you can't figure it out. But you also are an engineer, so after failing to figure out the problem, you now think about it again using all your engineering knowledge and bingo! This time you figure out the problem.
It doesn't work like that. What really happens is:
Your car breaks down. Knowing something about auto mechanics and engineering, you attempt to figure out what is wrong with it so you run though what you think might be the possible causes using all your auto mechanics knowledge and your engineering knowledge and bingo! You figure out the problem.
That second case is how a real brain does things, which is consistent with the literal wording in the OP.
Finally, if you want to challenge the characters, one roll is always more challenging than two. In the OP's example, if the character had a Knowledge religion skill of 4 and a Knowledge local skill of 3, his chance making one check is 65%, reasonably likely. If we make two checks, his chance of success rises to 86%. I guess if you don't want to challenge them
But that's just me. I don't the the RAW really cares, so each GM should figure out how he wants to do it.
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Your car breaks down. Knowing something about auto mechanics and engineering, you attempt to figure out what is wrong with it so you run though what you think might be the possible causes using all your auto mechanics knowledge and your engineering knowledge and bingo! You figure out the problem.
Yes, you would use both types of knowledge to make the check, as opposed to just one. While it's a bit clunky to represent these as separate tasks/rolls, it's still more accurate in my mind than saying that someone with training in two relevant fields of knowledge is no more likely to solve the problem than someone with only half the skill set.
As Nerloth suggested, the synergy bonus concept from 3E is more elegant: a +2 circumstance bonus to the primary check for characters with a second relevant skill.
I personally like the synergy idea best. I think I'll start doing it that way with the Hell's Rebels AP I'm about to start.