COURSE CURRICULUM

The four-year Bachelor of Arts Community Studies (BACS) in Religious Studies at Cape Breton University provides a structured and interdisciplinary exploration of world religions, belief systems, and their cultural and social significance. In the first year, students take introductory religious studies courses along with core community studies and general arts electives, focusing on foundational concepts such as major world religions, basic religious ideas, and academic approaches to studying religion. In the second year, students examine major traditions including Christianity, Islam, Judaism, Hinduism, Buddhism, and Indigenous spiritualities, while also studying themes such as rituals, myths, ethics, sacred texts, and the relationship between religion and culture in historical and contemporary contexts. In the third year, the curriculum becomes more advanced, with courses on religion and society, secularism, philosophy of religion, mysticism, death and afterlife, and contemporary global religious issues, often through seminar-based and research-oriented learning. In the fourth year, students complete senior seminars, advanced electives, and a capstone or independent research project that allows for deeper analysis of specific religious or cultural topics. Across all four years, students develop strong skills in critical thinking, research, writing, and comparative analysis, while the flexible BACS structure also allows electives from related disciplines such as sociology, history, and philosophy.