Icons of the Theotokos and Christ Child and of Saint Dimitrios the Great Martyr were installed on Tuesday at the new laboratory of the Bulgarian research base “St. Clement of Ohrid” on Livingston Island. The icons were donated by His Beatitude Patriarch Daniel of Bulgaria and His All-Holiness Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew.
Professor Christo Pimpirev, head of the 34th Bulgarian Antarctic Expedition, stated: “The icon of the Theotokos and Christ Child was donated during a ceremony at the Cathedral of St Alexander Nevsky, at which Patriarch Daniel of Bulgaria presided. It was offered to be placed at the Bulgarian base, to protect our Bulgarian settlement.”
The icon was installed in the building of the base’s new laboratory, which opened last year and has been in operation and inhabited since this year. The building includes dormitories for 14 people, as well as biology and geology laboratories and a common workspace.
“We also installed the icon of Saint Dimitrios, which was donated to us during a visit by a delegation of the Bulgarian Antarctic Institute to Constantinople to meet His All-Holiness Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew. The Patriarch donated it personally so that it, too, may safeguard the Bulgarian base,” Professor Pimpirev added.
He further explained that the icons were officially placed in the new building on Tuesday as “guardians of future generations” of polar researchers.