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.



April 7, 2021

Elder Savvas Lappas, a Spiritual Child of St. Savvas of Kalymnos and St. Amphilochios Makris


Elder Savvas Lappas, born in 1903 and baptized with the name Nikephoros, was a spiritual child of Saint Savvas of Kalymnos (1862-1948) on the island of Kalymnos and then a spiritual child of Saint Amphilochios Makris (1888-1970) on the island of Patmos. After living in asceticism on the island of Patmos for about twenty years, in 1960, at the age of 57 he returned to Kalymnos, took the name of his first spiritual father, Savvas, and lived in asceticism in the Hut of the Elevation of the Honorable Cross in Kantouni of Kalymnos until his death in 1992, on the 7th of April, which is the feast of his Elder, Saint Savvas of Kalymnos.

Monk Moses the Athonite wrote a book about Elder Savvas, noting his many virtues and spiritual gifts. He was most distinguished for his clairvoyance, silence and tears. Among the noteworthy events of his life together with his two holy spiritual fathers, 1) on one occasion in Kalymnos, while helping Saint Savvas of Kalymnos during the Divine Liturgy, he saw with his own eyes the consecrated Bread and Wine change into a slaughtered Infant on the Altar, with blood running down, which shocked him at his core, and 2) one night in Patmos, while praying on his knees outside his cell, he saw a pillar of light descend from Heaven and he was immersed in it, and not knowing what to make of it, Saint Amphilochios explained to him what the uncreated light of God was.
 
 

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