Having entered the Christmas season, we ask those who find the work of the Mystagogy Resource Center beneficial to them to help us continue our work with a generous financial gift as you are able. As an incentive, we are offering the following booklet.

In 1909 the German philosopher Arthur Drews wrote a book called "The Myth of Christ", which New Testament scholar Bart D. Ehrman has called "arguably the most influential mythicist book ever produced," arguing that Jesus Christ never existed and was simply a myth influenced by more ancient myths. The reason this book was so influential was because Vladimir Lenin read it and was convinced that Jesus never existed, thus justifying his actions in promoting atheism and suppressing the Orthodox Church in the Soviet Union. Moreover, the ideologues of the Third Reich would go on to implement the views of Drews to create a new "Aryan religion," viewing Jesus as an Aryan figure fighting against Jewish materialism. 

Due to the tremendous influence of this book in his time, George Florovsky viewed the arguments presented therein as very weak and easily refutable, which led him to write a refutation of this text which was published in Russian by the YMCA Press in Paris in 1929. This apologetic brochure titled "Did Christ Live? Historical Evidence of Christ" was one of the first texts of his published to promote his Neopatristic Synthesis, bringing the patristic heritage to modern historical and cultural conditions. With the revival of these views among some in our time, this text is as relevant today as it was when it was written. 

Never before published in English, it is now available for anyone who donates at least $20 to the Mystagogy Resource Center upon request (please specify in your donation that you want the book). Thank you.



December 13, 2016

18 Year Old Mute Spoke for First Time Before the Icon of Panagia Gorgoepikoos


By Elias Proufas

December 12, 2016

The incident happened just ten days ago at the Holy Monastery of Docheiariou in Mount Athos, and it was told to me yesterday evening by a Hieromonk who was present as a witness of this miraculous event, although he mentioned it publicly last week at a religious event in Thessaloniki.

Inside her home, at the Holy Monastery of Docheiariou in Mount Athos, where daily the revered Abbot Elder Gregory with the brotherhood of the monastery chant the Supplication Canon to her grace and commemorate hundreds of names on behalf of the health of the living and the repose of the dead, another one of our fellow men was praying in her chapel where he received in actuality the grace of the Panagia Gorgoepikoos, who quickly and obediently listens and has mercy on all who reverently call upon her with faith.

According to this witness, a young man from Skopje, who is 18 years old from the city of Stromnitsa in the neighboring country, who had problems speaking, went to the Holy Monastery of Docheiariou to venerate the miraculous icon of Panagia Gorgoepikoos. He had come with a relative from Thessaloniki who was speaking about this monastery and icon to his family. When they arrived at the monastery and stood before the icon, although the young man had never spoken in his life, he started crying out with inarticulate words in his native language: "Mother All-Holy, grant me my health!" At that moment everyone who knew the case of the young man was surprised by the incident. By the end of the prayers which the undisturbed Hieromonk continued reading, the young man from Skopje turned to all those who were present there praying with him and said: "I thank all of you; already I feel very well."

This is yet another display of the miraculous power of the Panagia Gorgoepikoos of the many which take place on a daily basis to the faithful of Greece and beyond, who daily chant her supplications: "To the ends of all things, your wonderworking icon is spoken of, by all from their lips, carrying the Gorgoepikoos."

Source: Translated by John Sanidopoulos.


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