Help with Apologetics Field-Based Activity: Cults

APOL 500

Apologetics Field-Based Activity: Cults Assignment Instructions

Overview

Mormonism and Jehovah’s Witnesses are two large American Christian cults, that is, they consider themselves to be Christian but differ from orthodox Christianity in its essentials. They will often differ in other ways, but apologetics should focus on the essentials and not on the peripherals. This last apologetics activity, in which you will communicate a simple apologetics argument to a person in a conversation (hopefully someone in the cult or who believes that the cult might be a true version of Christianity), provides you with an opportunity to construct a short argument for orthodox Christianity while noting the significant differences between Christianity and the cult and anticipating possible objections to the argument. Again, you will be sharing that argument “in the field.” Afterwards you will reflect on that activity and what you learned during the planning of your argument and from your conversation.

Instructions

A template will be used for this assignment. The Apologetics Field-Based Activity: Cults Template is in three sections. A minimum of two pages is required for the completed assignment. No title page is necessary since this is a template.

The template has three sections:

1. Argument Construction:

a. You will select a cult and indicate that you are addressing that cult for this assignment.

b. Plan how you hope to address the cult in a conversation. Tip: See Gould, p. 199, “Assignment 11-1: Making Gospel Connections” for a tip on how to begin.

c. Identify at least two to three essential differences and how you would address them.

After this, you are now ready to have your conversation.

2. The Conversation: This is simply a report on the context of the conversation. Simply insert the appropriate information.

3. The Reflection:

a. You will describe details about how the conversation went.

b. You will describe the reaction of your conversation partner both during and after the presentation of the argument.

c. You will describe what you might have done differently.

d. You will describe what you feel after the presentation about the strength of the argument.

While you should do research in planning your argument, a formal citation system is not required. Do, however, use quotation marks for any direct quotes with a footnote that follows current Turabian format indicating the source of the quote. The following cults are discussed in the Gould textbook:

· Mormonism

· Jehovah’s Witnesses

If your self-selected argument dealt with one of these cults, then you might want to choose a lesser known Christian cult. For an alternative cult, contact your professor for approval of that alternative.

Note: Your assignment will be checked for originality via the Turnitin plagiarism tool.

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