Resources

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Chapter K: Let Your Voice Be Heard: Synod on Cyberbullying

Students are challenged to write a speech as if they were a member of Pope Francis’ synod addressing the problem of cyberbullying.

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The Two Feet of Service and Justice

This chart provides students space to create examples of acts of charity and social justice for several real-life situations.

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Reflections on Poverty in America

This handout provides a series of Scripture passages and real-life accounts to help students reflect on poverty in America.

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Married Couple Interview

This handout provides the outline for an interview of a married couple.

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Dear Millie and Mike

This handout provides several real-life situations that teens might encounter. Students are challenged to respond to the situations and give advice to other teens.

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The Roles of Men and Women on TV: True to Life or Not?

This handout provides questions for students to answer as they observe the roles of men and women on TV.

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Fair Trade

This worksheet provides questions for students to answer as they research and learn about the Fair Trade Movement.

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Extra! Extra!

Students read two “news articles” and evaluate the morality of each by answering a series of questions.

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Music to My Ears

Students evaluate a contemporary piece of music based on several different categories of violence and disrespect.

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Ways to Respect Life

This worksheet challenges students to think about how they can value the dignity of life on a day-to-day basis.

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Justice in the World

This worksheet challenges students to think about how the teachings about Justice from the Bishops of the World apply to their daily lives.

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Teachings from the Catechism

This worksheet challenges students to think about how the teachings from the Catechism on the fourth commandment apply to their daily lives.

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Which Way Shall We Go?

This handout provides a chart for students to list activities that are best to do on Sunday and those that should be saved for other days of the week.

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A Doctrinal Scavenger Hunt

A scavenger hunt to find important Church doctrines, teachings and beliefs in the Catechism.

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Aiming for God Game

This handout contains cards to be used with the “Aiming for God Game”.

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The Transfiguration of Jesus

This worksheet helps students to read Scripture passages, answer questions about, and understand the importance of the Transfiguration of Jesus.

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Lead Me Not into Temptation

This handout presents different roles for students to act out from a real-life theft situation

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The Bible’s Practical Moral Advice

This worksheet guides students as they look up Scripture passages that give moral advice.

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Beatitudes Strips

A list of the Beatitudes organized to be cut into strips for a class activity.

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Exodus, Chapters 19–20

This handout provides a note-taking guide while reading chapters 19-20 from Exodus.

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Interview Chart for Religious Beliefs

This chart allows students to see the comparison between the beliefs of five major religions and those of the Catholic Church.

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Religious Identity Descriptions

This handout provides the religious identities for five major world religions.

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Catholic Social Teaching and the Common Good

This worksheet helps students to take notes as they read articles and make connections to the principles of Catholic Social Teaching.

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Empathizing (Religion in the Modern World)

This article provides several suggestions of ways to help students reflect on their experiences with people from different forms of religion in the modern world.

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Empathizing (Islam)

This handout provides several suggestions to help students draw connections between Islam and Christianity.

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Empathizing (Christianity)

This handout provides several suggestions to help students draw connections between the various denominations of Christianity.

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Empathizing (Judaism)

This handout provides several suggestions to help students draw connections between Christianity and Judaism.

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Empathizing (The Ancestors of the West)

This handout provides several suggestions to help students draw connections between Christianity and polytheistic religions of the West.

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Empathizing (Shinto)

This article provides several possible ideas of ways to help students see, experience, and better understand the Shinto religion.

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Empathizing (Zen Buddhism)

This short article provides questions, reflections, and suggestions to help students empathize with Zen Buddhism.

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Empathizing (Taoism)

This short article provides questions, reflections, and suggestions to help students empathize with Taoism.

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Empathizing (Confucianism)

This short handout provides questions, reflections, and suggestions to help students empathize with Confucianism.

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Empathizing (Sikhism)

This short handout provides questions, reflections, and suggestions to help students empathize with Sikhism.

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Empathizing (Jainism)

This short handout provides questions, reflections, and suggestions to help students empathize with Jainism.

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Empathizing (Buddhism)

This short handout provides questions, reflections, and suggestions to help students empathize with Buddhism.

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Empathizing (Hinduism)

This short handout provides questions, reflections, and suggestions to help students empathize with Hinduism.

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Empathizing (Indigenous Religious Traditions)

This short handout provides questions and reflections to help students empathize with indigenous religions.

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Comparing and Contrasting Religion in the Modern World with Christianity

This short handout compares and contrasts several key ideas and beliefs in Christianity and religion in the modern world.

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Comparing and Contrasting Islam with Christianity

This short handout compares and contrasts several key ideas and beliefs in Islam and Christianity

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Comparing and Contrasting Forms of Christianity

This short handout compares and contrasts several key ideas and beliefs in different forms of Christianity.

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Comparing and Contrasting Judaism with Christianity

This short handout compares and contrasts several key ideas and beliefs in Christianity and Judaism.

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Comparing and Contrasting the Ancestors of the West with Christianity

This short handout compares and contrasts several key ideas and beliefs in Christianity and the Ancestors of the West.

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Comparing and Contrasting Shinto with Christianity

This short handout compares and contrasts several key ideas and beliefs in Christianity and Shinto.

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Comparing and Contrasting Zen Buddhism with Christianity

This short handout compares and contrasts several key ideas and beliefs in Christianity and Zen Buddhism.

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Comparing and Contrasting Taoism with Christianity

This short handout compares and contrasts several key ideas and beliefs in Christianity and Taoism.

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Comparing and Contrasting Confucianism with Christianity

This short handout compares and contrasts several key ideas and beliefs in Christianity and Confucianism.

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Comparing and Contrasting Sikhism with Christianity

This short handout compares and contrasts several key ideas and beliefs in Christianity and Sikhism.

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Comparing and Contrasting Jainism with Christianity

This short handout compares and contrasts several key ideas and beliefs in Christianity and Jainism.

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Comparing and Contrasting Buddhism with Christianity

This short handout compares and contrasts several key ideas and beliefs in Christianity and Buddhism.

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Comparing and Contrasting Hinduism with Christianity

This short handout compares and contrasts the key ideas and beliefs in Christianity and Hinduism.

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Comparing and Contrasting Indigenous Religions Traditions with Christianity

This short handout compares and contrasts the ideas of god, an ultimate reality, and history between indigenous religious traditions and Christianity.

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Worldviews: Religions and Their Relatives

This article explores two examples of modern worldviews and how they different from traditional religions.

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The Comparative Study of Religions

An introduction to the comparative study of religions.

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Teacher Evaluation An Interreligious Interview

A teacher evaluation for interviewing someone of a different religion.

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An Interreligious Interview

This handout offers guidelines for setting up an interview with a person from a different religion.

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The Ninety-Nine Names of God

This handout lists the ninety-nine Islamic names for God and poses several questions regarding the list.

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"In the Beginning Was the Word"

After presenting John 1:1-18 from the Christian Bible, this handout challenges to students to identify key parts that describe the doctrine of the incarnation.

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Images of Jesus

This handout provides many different images and descriptions of Jesus for students to examine and relate to.

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Miriam's Shabbat

A Sabbath Blessing.

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Rings of Interpretation

This handout lists six excerpts taken from the Tanakh.

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Greek and Roman Gods Today

This handout challenges students to identify the associations they have with Greek and Roman gods.

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A Zoroastrian Symbol

This handout presents a Zoroastrian Symbol of faith and explains its elements. Students are then challenged to create their own symbol to represent their personal understanding of faith and human nature.

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"The Canticle of Brother Sun"

A Canticle prayer by Saint Francis of Assisi

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The Haiku of Basho

A compilation of Haiku by Matsuo Basho.

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Koans: Food for Intuition

This worksheet presents Zen koans to be interpreted or explained.

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The Riddler

This worksheet presents 12 riddles to be solved individually or in a small group

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Who Is the Sage?

This worksheet provides the opportunity to choose life situations that exemplify practices of the Taoist sage.

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The Sikh Khalsa

The information on this handout provides further insight into the nature of the Sikh Khalsa

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The Ten Gurus of Sikhism

This list of the ten Gurus of Sikhism briefly summarizes the key contributions of each Guru.

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The Biographies of the Tirthankaras

A list of patterns and themes found in the biographies of the Tirthankaras

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Kuan-Yin

A guided reflection of the Buddhist image of Kuan-Yin

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Monks

This handout is to be used as students rotate to various stations. At this station, students examine a picture depicting monks in Thailand.

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Objects Used in Tibetan Rituals

This handout is to be used as students rotate to various stations. At this station, students examine objects used in Tibetan rituals.

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The Fasting Siddhartha

This handout is meant to be used as part of a station activity in which students observe different pieces of artwork from various religions.

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Right Speech

This handout provides a reflection on students’ use of words and speech. Students identify ways to improve their use of words to speak truth and kind things.

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Right Meditation

This handout provides a space for students to write impressions, observations, or questions that arise as they meditate on a statue of Buddha.

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Buddhist and Judeo-Christian Understandings of God

This article compares and contrasts the Buddhist and Judeo-Christian understanding of God.

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The First Sermon at Deer Park

A Buddhist sermon

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"The Dance of Love"

A Hindu myth

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Karma Marga: "The Path of Works"

An individual worksheet that examines the intentions and motivations behind one’s actions.

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The Master and the Untouchable

An individual worksheet the caste system in India.

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The Fruits of Action

An individual worksheet that challenges students to apply teachings from the Bhagavad-Gita to real-life situations.

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Peer Evaluation: The Game of Samsara

A peer evaluation form of student-created games.

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Teacher Evaluation: The Game of Samsara

This evaluation is to be used as a rubric for a game that groups of students created using Hindu concepts.

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What Harm Is in Our Sun Dance?

This short article provides the point of view of a Blackfoot Indian about the illegalization of the Sun Dance.

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I Pray

This prayer for a large group asks for our eyes to be opened to the injustices in the world and our souls to be strengthened by Christ’s presence.

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What Can a Person Do?

This article gives several suggestions of how an individual can bring about distributive justice.

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The Plight of the Worlds' Children

This handout provides several statistics and pieces of information about the alarming needs of children in our world.

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Pushed Once Too Often

This handout presents a story about drug pushing in a school community. Students are challenged to reflect on several questions regarding the situation.

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Cases to Examine: Conscience and Guilt

Read the following cases. For each one, fill in the words that describe what kind of conscience and what kind of guilt the person has. Then write a sentence or two of advice that you would give to that person.

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The LISTEN Model

Briefly describe below a moral dilemma that an individual might face. For each section of the LISTEN process, fill in one or more things a person facing this dilemma might need to consider.

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Which Principles Apply?

he following moral principles (described in the text on pages 58–59) can be considered basic or foundational: a. Do good; avoid evil. b. Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. c. The end does not justify …

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Getting to Know My Parents' Views

This checklist will help you identify how well you understand your parents’ (or guardians’) views on moral issues and whether you think that your parents understand your views on moral issues.

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Cases to Examine: Moments in Competition

Read the following cases of competition and answer in writing the question for each.

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Peace: A Guide to Win-Win Conflict Resolution

The PEACE process is a way to approach a conflict so that the outcome is a win- win situation, one that ensures that the good of both parties is considered and given priority. PEACE stands for problem and purpose, empathy, …

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Peace: Exploring Terms

In the first blank column, express your own sense of what it means to live out the following traits. In the second blank column, explain what you think the culture teaches you it means to live out each trait. Leave …

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Earth-Friendly Living

This is a scavenger hunt for earth-friendly products suitable for a bedroom: furniture, clothes, and so on. Your goal is to furnish this room in the most earth- friendly and inexpensive way you can, while still furnishing a room you …

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The Eucharist in Mathari Valley

In 1986, Fr. Jim Notebaart flew to Nairobi, Kenya, to live and work as a missioner. Years later, he told an audience in the United States about an experience of Eucharist as transformation. Read this story and, on a separate …

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Lazarus and the Rich Man: A Sequel

Characters: Reader, Narrator, Servant, Levi, Hannah, Isaiah, Simeon.

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The Work of Art

Read the story below, and be prepared to discuss the questions that follow it.

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Work and Budgeting

Fill out the first empty column in this chart to reflect a family’s monthly budget. Leave the second column blank until you receive further instruction.

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Where Am I Called?

Answer the following questions about your calling.

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Diversity Awareness

Read down the first column, and for each description, mark an X in all the columns that apply to you. (If there is a description you do not feel comfortable writing down, make a mental note of it and leave …

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Participation in the Media

This handout lists several key questions to use when reading or viewing various media from the perspective of different groups of people. Choose one of the following groups of people, and on a separate sheet of paper, write answers to …

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Choosing Life

A handout with different cases about life issues.

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How Does the Culture Value Me?

A list of different roles and conditions of males and females within society.

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The Circle of Faith-in-Action

The steps of awareness, analysis, action, and new awareness are explained in this handout.

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A Sample Relationship Map

A sample of how to create a relationship map.

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Creating a Relationship Map

A relationship map provides a blueprint for justice—it reveals the conditions and relationships that are necessary to build a just situation. The following are steps to follow when creating a relationship map. To aid in understanding the steps, we will …

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What is the State of Justice?

Evaluate the degree to which the seven themes of Catholic social teaching are present in a given situation. Use the scale below each theme to rank the extent to which it is present or absent, and write N/A (not applicable) …

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The Universal Declaration of Human Rights

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which was adopted by the United Nations in 1948, sets the international standard for human rights. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights has thirty articles. The following list paraphrases and summarizes the articles from …

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Justice Resources

Brief description of organization/agency/group and the nature of its work: How does it build relationships? promote justice?

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Practicing Prophecy

An activity where students are given the opportunity to imitate the prophetic model by observing the world around them and attempting to interpret injustices.

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The Scriptures and Concern for Justice

A list of justice-centered biblical passages that can be used for preparing class prayers and liturgies, as a resource for assignments, and for your own reflection and prayer.

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Images of God, Understandings of Life

The sketches below represent the different images of God and understandings of life that were held by the Jewish wisdom sages. Beneath each sketch, list the wisdom books that correspond to that image.

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Laws to Live By Today

Translating Biblical laws into today’s world.

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Sample Lesson Planning Chart

A sample lesson plan.

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Teacher Evaluation: An Interreligious Interview

The following ratings identify your scores on a scale from 1 (poor) to 10 (excellent).

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Miriam's Shabbat

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Greek and Roman Gods Today

Next to the name of each god or goddess in the chart below, jot down any person, place, object, time, program, or product with which you associate the name. You may also note titles of songs or TV programs or …

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A Zoroastrian Symbol

The illustration on this handout is the Faravahar, a symbol of Zoroastrian faith. With the example of the Faravahar in mind, create, on a separate sheet of paper, a symbol that represents your own religious faith or personal understanding of …

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Koans: Food for Intuition

Read the following Zen koans two or three times. Choose one and answer or explain it.

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Who Is the Sage?

In each pair of situations below, one of the people described resembles the ideal of the Taoist sage, the person who lives in accord with Tao and practices the virtue wu-wei. Read each pair of situations and circle the letter …

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Chinese Calligraphy

Calligraphy is one of the cultural arts that was pursued in the process of becoming a chun-tzu. Try your hand at reproducing the Chinese characters below, drawing your versions in the space provided to the right of the characters. The …

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The Sikh Khalsa

The information on this handout provides further insight into the nature of the Sikh Khalsa.

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The Ten Gurus of Sikhism

This list of the ten Gurus of Sikhism briefly summarizes the key contributions of each Guru.

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Kuan-Yin

1. Look at the statue or picture at this station. 2. This image depicts the deity Kuan-yin. Write words that describe this image.

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Monks

1. Look at the picture at this station. 2. Write words that describe the actions that you see in the picture. 3. Write words that describe the relationships between people that you see in the picture.

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Objects Used in Tibetan Rituals

1. At this station are several objects. Some may look familiar. Gently pick up each object and examine it. SOME OF THE OBJECTS ARE FRAGILE. PLEASE HANDLE THEM CAREFULLY. 2. Write the following information about each object.

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The Fasting Siddhartha

1. Observe the statue or picture at this station. 2. Notice that it is probably different from almost any other image of the Buddha that you have seen. 3. Look closely and write down what you observe. How does this …

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Right Meditation

1. Here is a Buddha statue or picture. Sit quietly and stare at it. Meditate on it. Let it be a visual focus for your medi- tation. Learn from it. 2. Write any impressions, observations, or questions you have.

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Correlation to Curriculum Framework

Correlation to Curriculum Framework Course IV: Jesus Christ’s Mission Continues in the Church from The Church: Christ in the World Today.

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Chapter 45 Activity: The Two Feet of Service and Justice

Caring for others involves both acts of charity and acts of justice. Review the illustration on page 498 in the handbook, and then complete the following chart. For every person or group of people in need described in the left-hand …

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Chapter 45 Summary: Working for Justice

A summary of Chapter 45, Working for Justice from the Catholic Connections Handbook for Middle Schoolers, Second Edition.

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Chapter 7 Summary: The Human Person

A summary of Chapter 7, The Human Person from the Catholic Connections Handbook for Middle Schoolers, Second Edition.

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Chapter 6 Activity: Recognizing God’s Goodness

Have you ever noticed how news reports often feature bad news: natural disasters, crime, accidents, and so on? Even in your own life, you may sometimes feel like there’s bad news all around. But the reality is that despite the …

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Research Activity: Working for Social Justice

Answer the following questions about the organization you are researching. Use a separate sheet of paper as needed.

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Social Justice Organizations

A list of social justice organizations that can be cut out.

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Dialogue with Others

Excerpts from the address of Pope Benedict XVI on Thursday, April 17, 2008 at the John Paul II center in Washington D.C.

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Rubric for Final Performance Tasks for Unit 2

The rubric for the final performance task options for Unit 2 of Church History: Apostolic Times to Today. The options include creating a children’s picture book, or making a PowerPoint presentation for a parish community.

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Final Performance Task Options for Unit 2

The final performance task options for Unit 2 of Church History: Apostolic Times to Today. The options include creating a children’s picture book, or making a PowerPoint presentation for a parish community.

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Islam: Historical Orgins

Islam began almost two thousand years after the start of Judaism and more than six hundred years after Christianity. In fact, Islam, which goes back to the seventh century, began in support of the monotheism of these two religions, and …

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Chapter 24 Activities

Activities for Chapter 24 Social Justice including a core activity, core activity extension, and additional activities.

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Handout: Key Concepts Underlying Catholic Social Justice Teachings

Catholic social teaching is based on some key concepts. By applying these concepts to different social issues, the Church makes judgments about the correct direction to follow.

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Lesson 24 Summary

The lesson learning objectives and content summary for Lesson 24, Social Justice.

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Beliefs Practices and Attitudes

The beliefs, practices, and attitudes of the Catholic faith.