#apologist

• Apologue — A short allegorical narrative, usually in verse, possessing a moralizing or didactic character, where the characters are often personified animals, plants, or inanimate objects designed to illustrate a general ethical truth; synonymous with a fable. In a secondary masculine sense, the term denotes a person who enthusiastically praises, defends, or justifies a doctrine, idea, religion, or political system.
• Apologist — A person who enthusiastically and firmly praises, defends, or justifies a doctrine, an idea, a political system, or a religious belief against adverse attacks. In a historical ecclesiastical context, the term denotes Christian writers of the 2nd and 3rd centuries (such as Justin Martyr or Tertullian) who authored systematic works to demonstrate the validity of Christianity before pagan authorities.
• Apologist — A person who ardently praises, defends, or justifies a doctrine, idea, personality, political movement, or social system; a zealous and often uncritical defender of a cause. As an adjective, it describes a person or discourse marked by a tendency to excuse or rehabilitate controversial facts or theories, sacrificing objectivity in favor of ideological partisanship.
• Female apologist — A woman who passionately praises, defends, or justifies a doctrine, idea, personality, or ideological system; the feminine form for the term apologist. As an adjective, it describes a position, a work, a review, or a female attitude marked by programmatic praise for a structure, bypassing neutral critical analysis.
• Athenagoras — The name of a 2nd-century AD Christian philosopher (Athenagoras of Athens), a prominent apologist of the early Church, known for applying Platonic concepts to Christian theology and for his writings addressed to Roman emperors in defense of Christians. In modern history, the name also evokes Ecumenical Patriarch Athenagoras I, a major promoter of ecumenism and interfaith dialogue in the 20th century.