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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 witness, 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.

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