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.



May 7, 2021

Reflection for Bright Friday (St. Theophan the Recluse)


By St. Theophan the Recluse
 
There are certain individuals whom the holy fathers praise for their Christian lives, for they rose from the dead before the general resurrection. What is the secret of such a life? They mastered the characteristic features of a life according to the resurrection as they are shown in the word of God, and made them their own inner properties. The future life is devoid of all that is fleshly: there men neither marry, nor are women given in marriage, there they will not eat dead food, and they will receive a spiritual body. Thus, whoever lives estranged from all fleshly things receives in himself, or returns to himself, elements of the future life according to the resurrection. Reach the point that all fleshly things within you die, and you will be resurrected before the future resurrection. The apostle indicates the path to this when he says: "Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh" (Gal. 5:16). And he attests that through this path it is surely possible to attain what is awaited: "He that soweth to the Spirit," he says, "shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting" (Gal. 6:8).
 
 
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