Work has started again on the moribund St. Nicholas Greek Orthodox Church and National Shrine at the World Trade Center although it likely won’t be visible for another month.
The Minnesota company fabricating the exterior screen for the long-stalled project was paid $5.7 million and has resumed working on it, said Michael Psaros, the vice chairman of The Friends of St. Nicholas, which is trying to raise $42 million to finish the project.
Construction stopped in December 2017 when the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese ran out of money, leaving a half-built eyesore at the Trade Center site. The shrine will replace a more modest church destroyed in the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks and the total cost is expected to reach $80 million.
A nonprofit group called Faith: An Endowment for Orthodoxy and Hellenism voted last week to donate $20 million to the shrine, according to a report in the National Herald, a newspaper that covers the Greek community.
Psaros would not comment on the donation. He said George Marcus, a Greek American real estate billionaire, kicked in $2 million.
Work on the church itself should begin in March, Psaros said. The archdiocese has pledged to finish it by Sept. 11, 2021.
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