NEW YORK – “It has come a long way,” Archbishop Geron Demetrios of America told The National Herald about the rebuilding of the St. Nicholas Greek Orthodox Church at Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan. But it has a long way to go and so the expected time of opening will probably be next fall, he said.
Would Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew be there for the opening? “We have not discussed it,” Archbishop Demetrios said, but he has no doubts that the patriarch will find a way to be there.
Demetrios estimates the cost of the construction project to be around $35-$40 million, most of it coming from pledges, but emphasized that he is “not worried at all” about the money.
The church, once completed and open to the public, expects about 20,000 visitors per day. It will be a full-service Greek Orthodox Church, but there will be an area of worship and contemplation for all faiths, and to pay respects to the memories of those lost on 9/11.
The archbishop is taking a personal hand in supervising the iconography, having traveled to Mt. Athos several months ago to meet with expert iconographers there.
The project has been delayed by thirteen years, due to unfortunate clashes between the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey with the Archdiocese, until Governor Andrew Cuomo intervened and the project was given the green light to proceed.
STEEL AND MARBLE
The walls are already being erected and in preparation of the placement of the dome. Dozens of visitors approach the site daily, though for safety reasons are not allowed to walk too closely to the construction site.
It is expected that by October, the structure will begin to take the shape of a church, thus beginning to resemble the design now well-known to the public conceived by architect Santiago Calatrava, inspired by and resembling Hagia Sophia in Constantinople.
The exterior will be adorned by marbles from Greece’s Penteli mountain and will appear to glow in the dark, thus creating a beautiful nighttime vista.