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I forego developing an argument that this is how doing theology in the normative, and so proper, sense is to be understood. 'Been there . and done that, many times over, as my books, On Theology and Doing Theology Today, especially, will show. Suffice it to say here only that, ifbearing if bearing witness itself is the kind of . life-praxis it certainly appears to be, then something very like my understanding of doing theology would seem to be the only understanding that itself will prove to be appropriate when judged by specifically Christian experience of Jesus Christ as well as credible when judged by the criteria of common human experience.

But if I now assume this normative understanding, and also rely on my opinions about the present theological situation, such as they are, the only answer I can give to our question is that present prospects for doing theology are

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rather dim. The main reason for this, of course, is that, in my opinion, as I've said, the predominant normative understanding of doing theology even in our situation today is the traditional understanding, by which I mean the understanding, according to which, theology even in the strict sense is to be done relatively less, rather than more, critically. To do theology, in other words, is to critically appropriate bearing witness, or to critically reflect on it, not by employing the ultimate, or primal, criteria of experience and reason, suitably differentiated according to particular context and case, but rather by simply employing the customary criteria for determining the meaning of bearing witness as well as its validity, its appropriateness and its credibility. But, then, in direct proportion to the extent to which this traditional understanding still predominates even in our theological situation, the only way of doing theology whose present prospects are bright is, in my understanding, really a way of doing something else. It is really a way of bearing Witnesswitness, inasmuch as it is done on the same primary level of self-understanding and life-praxis on which witness is borne, as distinct from the secondary level of critical reflection and proper theory, on which, I hold, doing theology properly is done.

I underscore, however, that this assessment of present prospects for doing theology as not very bright depends as much on my opinions about our present theological situation as on my understanding of how doing theology ought to be done. And opinions are merely that -- opinions. So it's entirely possible that a different, more reliable, descriptive or historical understanding of our situation, and of the various factors in it, would yield a more optimistic assessment, even assuming something very like my normative or systematic understanding. But, leaving any proof of how real this possibility is to others of you in our subsequent discussion, I wantto want to voice yet another of my opinions -- or, better, to report one of the observations I've repeatedly made that has gone to form the opinions I've already expressed.

Nothing in my experience more strikingly inqicates the continuing predominance of what I've called the traditional understanding of doing theology than the hold it evidently has all across the theological spectrum -'- On on the theological left as well as on the theological right. Without explaining the typology I'm assuming in putting it this way, I'll say simply that it is constructed by reference to the two basic claims of bearing witness; : to be appropriate to Jesus Christ and to be credible to human existence. Whereas, then, the center of the theological spectrum is conceived to be occupied by theologies of a type equally concerned with both the appropriateness and the credibility of bearing witness, theologies on the right are conceived as belonging to types concerned more or less one-sidedly with its appropriateness, while theologies on the left are conceived to belong to types more or less one-Sidedly sidedly concerned with its credibility. In my experience, theologies of all types can be done more or less critically in pursuing their respective concerns. But theologies belonging to types on the left have regularly shown themselves to be no more critical invalidating in validating the claim of bearing witness to be credible than theologies belonging to types on the right are in validating its claim to be appropriate. Instead of appealing solely to the ultimate, or the primal, criteria of common human experience and reason based on experience, they determine the credibility of bearing witness simply by

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its agreement with some particular philosophy or world view that happens to be
current and choice in the particular communities in and for which they are
working -- in much the same way as theologies belonging to types on the right
are rightare content to judge the appropriateness of bearing witness simply by its
agreement with criteria customarily employed in the church, such as scripture, or
scripture and tradition, instead of employing solely the ultimate, or the primal,
criteria of specifically Christian experience.

I won't take the time to argue this point in any detail. But I think you'll agree with me that theologies on the left, such as certain recent liberation theologies, with their uncritical employment of Marxist theory, or feminist theory, and their demand that theologians already be committed to the corresponding forms of liberating praxis in order to do theology at all, provide textbook examples of what I'm talking about. And the same is true, I submit, of many self-sty led styled pluralist theologies that uncritically appeal simply to some secular philosophy, or philosophy of religion! /philosophical theology, to . determine whether or not the claim of bearing witness to be credible is a valid claim.

In any case, I've yet to experience anything in theologies on the theological left, any more than on the right and in the center, that would cause me to change my opinion that the traditional understanding of doing theology is still very much alive and well in our situation today. But, then, assuming my revisionary understanding of how theology ought to be done, I simply cannot be optimistic about present prospects for doing it. So long as the traditional understanding prevails, and praxis accords with theory, the chances of theology'S s being done, as I maintain it should be done, are slim.

I want to close by pointing up an implication of my argument that I shouldn't want anyone in this group to miss. I'm drawing entirely on memory in speaking of "this group," because I haven't found anyone so far who has been able to confirm what I want to say. But I distinctly recall that, in the early to mid1990smid-1990s, when I attended several of its meetings as a guest of myoId my oId friend, Noble Kime, announcements of meetings and associated mailings regularly reached me under a superscription giving it some such title as "the group for the advancement of empirical theology." Unfortunately, I can no longer find, or no longer have, the file in which I kept these mailings. But, as I say, I'm morally . certain that, at that time, "the Potthoff group" was really only the nickname of the group whose formal, if perhaps not official, self-designation explicitly identified it, in some terms or other, with furthering the cause of empirical theology. Anyhow, the long and close association of the group with empirical theology is hardly in doubt; and the implication I want to point up is that my plea, in what I've said today, for a more rather than a less critical way of doing theology might very well be taken as pleading for a more rather than a less empirical way of doing theology. If, as I've argued, the criteria employed by a more critical way of doing theology are solely the criteria of experience and reason based on experience, then my plea for a more critical theology is by clear implication also a plea for a more empirical theology.

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Of course, we all do well to remember Whitehead's quip that lithe "the word 'experience' is the most deceitful in philosophy," and that an analogous comment can and must be made about the phrase "empirical theology." Just as important, we need to keep in mind the significant breakthrough made by Popper's proposal that the term "empirical" be used in its strict and proper sense, to mean "falsifiable by experiential observation." But what I take these and other similar cautions to amount to is that the legitimate motive in the cause of empirical theology, which the Potthoff group, in its way, has been committed to advancing, is that theology should always be done, as Karl Barth once put it, abOVO ab ovo, from the egg, by returning ever again anew to its primal sources in experience: to specifically Christian experience of Jesus Christ and to common human experience of existence as such.

So I cannot but hope that, even ifyou if you tend to share my assessment, you may well have your own reasons for wishing, as I do, that the prospects for doing Christian theology in this critical, experiential way were a good deal brighter than they unfortunately seem to be.