(Photo: James L. Boka)
Trinity Church is a beautiful little Russian Orthodox Church in Antarctica. It was built in the 1990s and is manned year-round. Atlas Obscura reports:
While most of buildings on this continent are built to hug the ground in order to reduce their exposure to the polar wind, this church proudly stands 50 feet tall. It is a wooden structure built from Siberian pine and carved in the traditional Russian style by master carpenters of Altay.
The priests manning the church take care of the spiritual needs of the staff of nearby Russian, Chilean, Polish, and Korean research stations. Their obligations include praying for the souls of 64 Russians who lost their lives in various expeditions, and the very occasional, very chilly, baptism.
While the church is large enough to accommodate 30 visitors, it is rarely filled to capacity. In 2007, however, the church performed its first wedding -- the first wedding ever celebrated in a church in Antarctica -- between Chilean and Russian researchers.
P.S. This isn't the only church in Antarctica. McMurdo Station is serviced by the Chapel of the Snows.