ABSTRACT
This chapter considers actual reports of knowledge and/or experience of God, with regard to both arts in general and to specific works of art, as evidence supporting a natural theology of the arts. It is important to clarify experience in this context; it is a portmanteau term to cover two sorts, the first being the dramatic or pointed religious experiences of the kind which might prompt one to say, 'whatever appeared to me on the mountain was God'. The second are the diffuse experiences which form the subject of subsequent metaphysical reflection, the kind on which Aquinas based his proofs for the existence of God. Polkinghorne agrees with Soskice in relating the general character of the second type to natural theology while relating the individuality of the first type to the artists journey of intensification into particularity. The chapter concludes with examination of specific rumours of real presences.
