Parish (Church of England)

High variance exists in the size of parishes, attendees and the number of christenings (baptisms), marriages, funerals and donations.

Each parish is considered in the annual assessment and rebalancing of the diocese which pays the clergy's income (and indirectly by the Commissioners as regards most old endowments which are held in common).

A Latin variant of the Greek paroikia, the dwelling place of the priest, was used by the eighth Archbishop of Canterbury Theodore of Tarsus (who lived c. 602 to 690).

First seen in written English when that tongue came back into writing in the late 13th century, the word parish comes from the Old French paroisse, in turn from Latin paroecia,[3] which is the latinisation of the Greek παροικία (paroikia), "sojourning in a foreign land",[4] itself from πάροικος (paroikos), "dwelling beside, stranger, sojourner",[5] which is a compound of παρά (para), " beside, by, near"[6] + οἶκος (oikos), "house".

From the Greek paroikia, the dwellingplace of the priest, eighth Archbishop of Canterbury Theodore of Tarsus (c. 602–690) applied the ecclesiastical term parish to the Anglo-Saxon township format which were already in existence.

[8] Having provided the land and usually the building the landowner reserved the right, "the advowson", to select a parish priest subject to the bishop's approval.

Most ecclesiastical parish boundaries, in a few places perambulated each year by beating the bounds, loosely resembles one or more great estates of more than one thousand years ago but more precisely tends to date from simplifications since the 17th century to fit a parish with the updated landowner's bounds assumed (taken on) over intervening centuries thereby minimising disputes.

Some sparsely populated areas of England were outside any parish, i.e. extra-parochial until the 19th century, though a very few technical exceptions remain (most notably royal peculiars).

In the Church of England, the legal right to appoint or recommend a parish priest is called an advowson, and its possessor is known as a patron.

Appointment (being invested as) a parish priest gave the incumbent many more privileges than today of having their benefice also termed a living – notably a wide range of lower to upper middle class incomes, depending on the type of benefice, hence most old summaries of parishes state the gross or net value of a living, whether present or in the Tudor-period King's Books which is an indicative starting point.

Patronage thus has passing relevance to the small group of patrons today strongly geared towards one style of churchmanship or another – it is far from the final say on the matter.

[11] Subject to local covenants, and their wealth, many church patrons contributed much to funds (beyond the by Poor Law Reforms-abolished system of rates).

By an injunction of the King's Visitors in 1548 (reign of Edward VI) their duties were redefined; the custom of holy water sprinkling was abolished.

The clerk then began to be an assistant to the churchwardens in collecting money (the Rates, tithes and any extra donations) such as for the benefit of the poor as well as continuing in some of his other functions.

[13] In the absence of any other authority (which there would be in an incorporated city or town), the vestry, the ecclesiastical parish administrative centre, was the recognised unit of local government, concerned for the spiritual but also the temporal as well as physical welfare of parishioners and its parish amenities, collecting local rates or taxes and taking responsibility for the care of the poor, roads, law enforcement, etc.

The responsible householder found himself bound to serve in succession in the onerous and wholly unpaid public offices of by rotation every man was called upon in church to send his team or go in person to labour for six days on the roads.

Increasingly from the 17th century, the wealthy classes in town or country could buy exemption from, or commute for money, many of the innumerable personal obligations imposed by the parish,[15] and largely interacted with the vestry therefore only as a taxing authority.

It is since 1974 been the level of local government below district and borough councils and since 1992 patchwork rationalisation all county or city-wide unitary authorities of England.