Certificate in Christian Apologetics:
The C.S. Lewis Collection

APOL 501 | 5 Courses (15 Credits) | Professor: Eric Needle

Certificate Overview

This certificate draws exclusively from the apologetic works of C.S. Lewis, forming a cohesive introduction to Christian defense of the faith through reason, imagination, and lived experience. Each course revolves around an anchor text from Lewis’s corpus, read slowly and deeply (one chapter per session), fostering transformative discussions and reflections. 

Ideal for those discerning a call to apologetics, teaching, writing, or cultural engagement. Stackable toward an Associate or Bachelor’s Degree.

Thread: Apologetics

Format: Online or hybrid; 12 sessions per course; mentor-guided.

Outcomes: Graduates will articulate Lewis’s key arguments, apply them to contemporary challenges, and integrate apologetics into personal ministry.

Required Texts: (6) See Individual Courses

Enrollment: Open when all five courses are fully syllabused (target: Spring 2026).

The Five Courses

APOL 101: The Case for the Christian Faith
Mere Christianity by C.S. Lewis

APOL 102: Spiritual Warfare and Temptation
The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis

APOL 103: Heaven, Hell, and Human Choice
The Great Divorce by C.S. Lewis

APOL 104: Why Does God Allow Pain?
The Problem of Pain by C.S. Lewis (Weeks 1–6)
A Grief Observed by C.S. Lewis (Weeks 7–12)

APOL 105: Miracles, Reason, and the Natural Order
Miracles by C.S. Lewis

Certificate in Christian Literature:
The J.R.R. Tolkien Collection

MYTH 501 | 5 Courses (15 Credits) | Professor: Ryan Needle

Certificate Overview

This certificate immerses students in the legendarium of J.R.R. Tolkien, exploring how myth, story, and sub-creation reveal profound theological truth about God, providence, fall, redemption, and hope. Each course follows a single major work, read slowly and contemplatively—one chapter or narrative section per week—inviting students to inhabit Middle-earth as a “secondary world” that illuminates the Primary World and the Gospel itself.

Ideal for writers, artists, pastors, teachers, and anyone called to wield imagination in service of the Kingdom; those who sense that story is one of God’s chief languages.

Thread: Christian Literature

Format: Online or hybrid; 12 sessions per course; mentor-guided.

Outcomes: Graduates will be able to

• Articulate Tolkien’s theology of sub-creation, catastrophe, and the “long defeat”
• Trace biblical echoes and sacramental patterns throughout the legendarium
• Apply mythopoeic* imagination to preaching, teaching, art, and cultural engagement
• Read literature as an act of theological reflection

Required Texts: (5) Affordable editions linked below (paperback or quality used copies strongly encouraged so students can mark up their own “leaves of the Tree of Tales”).

*Mythopoeic means “relating to or involved in the creation of myths”. The term is commonly used in literature to describe works, particularly in fantasy and science fiction, that create a new, artificial mythology or transform existing mythological elements into a new narrative.

The Five Courses

MYTH 101: There and Back Again: The Call to Adventure
The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien

MYTH 102: Friendship, Providence, and the Burden of Sin
The Fellowship of the Ring by J.R.R. Tolkien

MYTH 103: Despair, Duty, and the Mercy of Death
The Two Towers by J.R.R. Tolkien

MYTH 104: Kingship, Healing, and the Scouring of Home
The Return of the King by J.R.R. Tolkien

MYTH 105: Creation, Fall, and the Long Hope
The Silmarillion by J.R.R. Tolkien