Blind children in St. Petersburg will receive carved icons blessed on Mount Athos as New Year gifts

Carved icons blessed on Holy Mount Athos will be given on December 16, 2005, to children in Kindergarten No. 53 for blind and poor-sighted children in St. Petersburg.

The icons of Christ the Saviour, the Holy Protomartyr and Healer Panteleimon and St. Sergius of Radonezh had been sent last autumn to Greece. They came back in early December together with gifts from the Athonite monastery – little crosses made of olive tree and little icons.

‘These icons are special in that they can be ‘seen’ by blind children. The high-quality raise work can be felt by children’s fingers, thus creating a valid visual image. Consecrated on Mount Athos, these icons are New Year gifts to blind children’, said masters from the Nasledie (Heritage) art shop which has produced these icons.

The art shop helps the Center for Blind and Poor-sighted Children in St. Petersburg as well as children’s institutions in Saratov and Sergiev Posad by producing these icons within the Icons for Blind Children project.