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 17, 2017

Synaxarion of Saint Dounale the Confessor, Who Was Renamed Stephen

St. Dounale the Confessor (Feast Day - December 17)

Verses

Stephen was vested with crowns of virtues,
Shining here he goes to the crowns above.

He was a ruler of his own land, which was an island, called by some Nivertis, and by others Berroe. It is rained upon by the ocean, and located near the Gadeiras [Cadiz], which is a neck of land in Spain. He had much wealth, and was raised with pious faith and Christian doctrines, who lived more for God than for people. The renowned one counted all the things of this world as dung, and he left his authority to his sons. And going to Rome, he was dressed in the monastic schema, namely that of a crusader. He then withdrew from there, and went to famed Constantinople. There he conversed with the emperors Constantine and Romanos Porphyrogenitos in the year 919, by whom he was sent to Jerusalem (for this is what he sought from them). Arriving there, he received the great and angelic schema by the Patriarch of Jerusalem known as Christodoulos, and from Dounale he was renamed Stephen.

The blessed one was much assaulted and beaten by the Saracens, by whom his beard was shaven off. From Jerusalem he went to Miseri [Egypt]. There he was held prisoner with two other priests who followed him. He remained six months there, and suffered from hunger and thirst and the other hardships of prison, and was sent to the Amir of Egypt. By him he was tied with heavy bonds, and the renowned one was urged to renounce Christ. Because he remained steadfast and could not be conquered, but boldly confessed our Lord Jesus Christ, he was punished with harsher torments and wounds than the first. From the distress, the thrice-blessed one fell ill. While ill he departed this present temporary life, and went to that which is above and eternal, for he was first notified by God of his repose.

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