The parish family and friends of St. Athanasius Orthodox Church celebrated a great milestone in the history of our parish: the Groundbreaking on our permanent church home in Nicholasville. Our thanks goes firstly to His Eminence, our Archbishop Nikon, for blessing this work, and to His Grace, Bishop Mark (Maymon), for being willing to come be with us, preside at the Saturday Groundbreaking, and serve the Hierarchical Liturgy on Sunday. We are also grateful to our brothers and sisters, the Orthodox believers of Lexington and their clergy who attended. Finally, we are thankful for the support of our local political leaders, most especially Rep. Bob Damron, Mayor Russ Meyer, and City Commissioner Pete Sutherland, who all attended the Groundbreaking and offered words of congratulations to our parish.
What are the next steps in our project?
- We are almost ready to send out bids to four general contractors and present plans to the city for approval.
- The parish council will then recommend a contractor to the parish.
- The parish body will then have final say in a parish meeting in September (probably Sept. 22) and will consider not only final plans but also contractor choice.
- We hope to have bulldozers on the property Oct. 1.