Bishop Kliment of Levki, deputy to the Metropolitan of the US, Canada and Australia, will join Bulgaria's 35th Antarctic expedition, Prof Hristo Pimpirev, head of the Bulgarian Antarctic Institute, has said.
The bishop met today with Prof Pimpirev, Assoc Prof Yuriy Kuchev and Kiril Kandilarov of the institute at the National Polar Research Centre at Sofia University "St Kliment Ohridski". Pimpirev said Bulgarian Patriarch Daniil had blessed him to take part in the expedition.
In Antarctica, the bishop will consecrate the Orthodox chapel of St John of Rila and the new science laboratory at the Bulgarian polar base on Livingston Island. He will also hold spiritual talks with the polar team.
On the way, he will meet the Bulgarian community in Buenos Aires, Argentina. The institute says the group will look at options for a Bulgarian Orthodox church there. It would be the first and only one in all of South America.
Prof Pimpirev, who leads Bulgaria's Antarctic expeditions, told BTA on 9 April that the institute is already preparing the 35th. Once again it will include many science projects. Geologists will work near the Livingston base and on the South Shetland Islands.
Underwater archaeology experts are also due to go. They will study a bay where shipwrecks are thought to lie.