Our new Metropolitan of Petrograd, Pitirim, fortunately considers the Parish question to be of enormous importance. He ascribes to it even the power for future victory over our enemies. The Metropolitan, of course, is a great authority, and the Duma seems to be sharing his views. The proposal in Orthodox Church circles is to bring back life to the parish, which at present seems to be greatly neglected and to be losing its legitimate ground. The resurrection of parish life has indeed long been hoped for. The plan for its revival is complete, and is only waiting to be made public. The Holy Synod, as is well known, has presented lately to the Duma a project that was due to the initiative of M. Sabler (now called Desyatovski). For some reason or other this project had been abandoned and withdrawn by its author, to the great dismay of many who are fervently Greek Orthodox. The Metropolitan, Pitirim, is now making every effort to introduce into the Duma other projects {279} of great importance. In any case, however incomplete or imperfect these projects may be, it is imperative to apply them with as little delay as possible, practical experience being itself the best leveller of defects. How satisfactorily the reorganisation of parishes will revive Church life, we shall see. History, with which all who are interested in this question should acquaint themselves, gives ample evidence of how gradually this ecclesiastical arrangement has died out. The ancient Russian parish was something very different from what is implied by the present meaning of the term. As everybody knows, a modern parish is simply a certain amount of property within the boundaries of a limited distance from a given church. Social life within the parish has of late been diminishing, and the activities of parishioners in parish matters scarcely go beyond the election of a churchwarden, and the payment of his wages. The part allotted to them in all other matters is purely passive, and consists principally of paying subscriptions to various brotherhoods and charitable institutions. In other words, if the priest happens to enjoy some authority or popularity among his flock, such institutions flourish by aid of voluntary contributions. In other cases, they exist only on paper, this deception being used because their upkeep is desired by the higher powers, disobedience to whom might have occasionally disagreeable consequences to the parish control.