On Christian Discernment and the Problem of the Theological

Abstract

This article lays the groundwork for a theology of discernment that seeks to address modern anxieties about the integrity of the theological by showing how Christian believers are sanctified for the identification of true speech about God. It does so by arguing that post-Kantian understandings of the activity of the human subject in judgement need not be seen as inimical to an account of Christian discernment, that recognition of Paul's understanding of the place of discernment in the Christian life points to alternatives to Barth's attempt to resolve the difficulties of the theological through an exclusive appeal to divine activity, and that Augustine develops a helpful account of the place of a theology of discernment in addressing the problem of the theological by treating the connection between these topics as an element within theologies of sanctification and creaturely vocation.