The Russian Golgotha: The Lives of the Holy New Martyrs and Confessors of Russia

by Vladimir Moss

A new history series from Monastery Press, The Russian Golgotha), tells the story of Russia's new martyrs — men, women, and children slain for their refusal to abandon their Orthodox Christian Faith even under the most severe pressure from Communist authorities in the 20th century. Written by eminent Orthodox Church historian Vladimir Moss, this 536-page account of selected martyrs' lives, including the Russian Royal Family, includes other material never before published in English or Russian, and is an invaluable resource for anyone interested in this dark, yet ultimately triumphant era in Church history.

535 pages, Hardcover

Published January 1, 2006

About the author

Vladimir Moss was born Anthony Moss in London on April 4, 1949 into the family of a British diplomat. In 1952, when his father took up a diplomatic post in Belgrade, he went to a Serbian primary school. In 1955, when his father moved to the United States, he went to an American school. Returning to England in 1958, he entered Twyford prep school, near Winchester. In 1962 he entered Charterhouse school, Godalming on a junior scholarship, specializing in Classical languages and ancient history. In 1967 he went up to Oxford University on a classical scholarship, and graduated in 1970 with a second class degree in Philosophy and Psychology. In the summer of 1970 he spent six weeks traveling and studying Russian in the Soviet Union. After six months teaching English in a language school in Bratislava, Slovakia, in 1971 he started a M.Sc. course in clinical psychology in the University of Newcastle–upon–Tyne. Abandoning the course in May, 1972, he started a Ph.D. in psychology at Surrey University, Guildford under the supervision of Dr. Don Bannister, receiving the degree in 1978 for his thesis, The Dramaturgical Deep Structure of Personality. Also in 1978 he received a diploma for the teaching of English as a foreign language from Trinity college, London. In 1974 two of his articles were published in The British Journal of Medical Psychology.

On February 15, 1974 he joined the Moscow Patriarchate in London, and was made a reader on November 21 for the English Orthodox Parish in Guildford, Surrey. In 1975 he joined the Russian Church Abroad, and on April 18, 1976 was baptised in London. In 1979 his first book, The Imperishable Word, was published.

From 1978 to 1981 he was employed as a teacher of English at the Harven school of English in Woking, Surrey.

In 1982 he was married to Olga Mount.

From 1982 to 1984 he was unemployed, and used the time to write a history of the Anglo–Saxon Church. From 1984 to 1985 he worked as a teacher of English in Thessaloniki, Greece. From 1986 to 1987 he studied Russian at the University of Surrey in Guildford, receiving a diploma. From 1987 to 1989 he was a research fellow in the Departments of Psychology and Linguistic & International Studies in the University of Surrey, designing and carrying out experiments testing the psycholinguistic theory of basic colours. The results were published in The International Journal of Psychology, Quinquereme, Lingua, and Linguistics.

In 1989, while continuing to be employed as a part–time research fellow for the University of Surrey, he took up a post as translator in the publishing house Raduga in Moscow.

Returning to England in November, 1991, he undertook Russian–English translation work for several English and Dutch companies. In 1992 he was commissioned by the Orthodox Foundation of St. Michael, Guildford to write a History of the Greek Old Calendarist Movement.

From 1993 to 1994 he was lecturer in Psychology and Religion at the University of St. Clement of Ohrid in Sophia, Bulgaria. At the same time he taught English in the New University and in a private school.

Returning to England, he taught English at Multilingual school, Guildford (until 2000), and started a bed–and–breakfast business.

He is now fully employed in the writing of books on the Orthodox Church and Orthodox Church history.
Official Biography

Reviews

[David Di Giacomo · Rating 4 out of 5]

The title page says "compiled by Vladimir Moss", and that little word "compiled" explains a lot about this book. Much material in the lives of some of these martyrs and confessors is copied verbatim (or excerpted, or condensed) from other sources, such as Russia's Catacomb Saints. This gives the book a somewhat patchwork quality. Due to the disparity in availability of information, some of the lives are full narratives, others are merely collections of factoids such as one might find on a Wikipedia stub, and others spend a lot of time on seemingly minor details while wrapping up important things in just a few words. This, I suppose is to be expected. It seems this book was an effort to make all the available information available, so it is less "readable" than Russia's Catacomb Saints, but it is also more complete.

There are multiple editing problems (chunks of text being repeated verbatim), especially at the beginning, which show that this book, though handsomely bound and beautifully illustrated, was not ready for publication, which is too bad. The author himself has made a heavily revised version available for free download on his own website, which seems to be a disavowal of this edition. Again, too bad. It would have been nice if he had taken the time to finish his work properly and then we would have several handsomely bound hardcovers rather than several PDFs to print off.

The lives of these saints are incredibly inspiring regardless of the flaws and inevitable limitations in their presentation, so despite all the foregoing, on the whole I would recommend this book. But if you will only read one book on the New Martyrs and Confessors of Russia, read Russia's Catacomb Saints. It is out of print indefinitely and the publisher wants everyone to forget about it, but with a little clever searching online you can find a copy.