ABSTRACT
Somewhere in this century the term 'experience' begins to appear with regularity in the titles of articles and books in Christian theology and makes its way into proposals for methodological and doctrinal developments. Similarly, in the common parlance of the Christian faithful, and especially of students of theology, a similar appeal to 'my experience', or the experience of a particular group, has become theological common sense. When one asks about what sort of appeal it is, whether it is philosophically coherent, and whether it is appropriate to the task of Christian theology, such questions are often greeted with surprise. What could be more obvious than the appeal to experience, its inevitability, or even its momentous appropriateness at this point in the history of Christianity and its theology?
