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 1 Text|     self-evident fact that the parish as we understand it now,
 2 Text|      at all so normative. The "parish" as we know it today is,
 3 Text|    development of the Orthodox parish in America. ~The first thing
 4 Text|    marry and bury - not for a "parish," as understood today, but
 5 Text|        today, but rather for a parish in the old and traditional
 6 Text|        who is the owner of the parish Church. It was literally
 7 Text|  change in the old idea of the parish: that of the parish as owner
 8 Text|        the parish: that of the parish as owner of property. And
 9 Text|   second change. The immigrant parish was poor, and to have even
10 Text|       at the very heart of the parish's life. In fact, the parish
11 Text|    parish's life. In fact, the parish organization was born as
12 Text|        the Church, and not the parish, being at first the goal
13 Text|       the justification of the parish. But an organization, when
14 Text|          Finally, the Orthodox parish became what it is today:
15 Text|        And it is no longer the parish that serves the Church,
16 Text|     more and more to serve the parish, to accept it as its "goal"
17 Text|        of the "Church" in the "parish," is considered good when
18 Text|     the Church to those of the parish. ~The third and the most
19 Text|      the secularization of the parish and the corresponding loss
20 Text| seriousness. A modern American parish may have many good aspects,
21 Text|        organization, i.e., as "parish" it, in fact, opposes this
22 Text|      efficient way to fill the parish treasury than any appeal
23 Text|    Christian." ~To be exact, a parish organization lives by standards
24 Text|       is due to God alone. The parish organization has replaced
25 Text|   radically different from the parish of the past. It has ceased