In honor of Orthodox Christmas, a group of researchers from Skopje and Tetovo, led by the director of the Institute for the Study of Albanian Traditions, History, and Culture (ITSHKSH), Prof. Dr. Skender Asani, visited Bitola. The first stop of this visit was the church of St. Dimitri, built in 1834, where several generations of the Qiriazi family and other Albanian Orthodox families from Bitola and its surroundings were baptized. The churchyard still preserves traces of the presence of Albanian Orthodoxy through the graves where the remains of the extended Qiriazi family and other Albanian Orthodox families from the region have rested for decades.
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To honor the guests, the Oliver Qiriazi family, along with their young daughter Kirijana, hosted a Christmas lunch.
In the calendar of important cultural and spiritual events of ITSHKSH, starting from the next year, precisely on January 7th, the Albanian Orthodox Christmas celebration will be observed in Bitola. This celebration mirrors the Albanian Catholic Christmas festivities held every December 23rd.
This activity will coincide with the initiation of the Cultural Heritage Department for the Polog region – "Qiriazi," led by Oliver Qiriazi.
Within this department and its research activities, ITSHKSH will focus on illuminating and promoting the forgotten cultural-spiritual values of Albanian Orthodox heritage from the Polog region and beyond.
The researchers from Skopje and Tetovo, Dr. Besnik Rameti, head of the Department of History at ITSHKSH, and Mr. Ismet Krosi, a lecturer at the University of Tetovo, led by director Prof. Dr. Skender Asani, through this visit to Bitola, opened a new path in revitalizing a new cultural-spiritual reality, rightfully placing Albanian Orthodoxy in North Macedonia.