Changes

The OCA began with the missionary work of the [[Church of Russia|Russian Orthodox Church]] in Alaska and the Aleutian Islandsby eight Orthodox monks who arrived in Alaska in 1794. They were part of the centuries-old missionary heritage of the Russian Orthodox Church that brought the Orthodox Church, by the monks Hourg and Barsanuphii, to the Mongol peoples. And monk St Stephen of Perm (1340-96) who would in turn journey beyond Kazan, across the Ural mountain, into the forests of Siberia to bring Orthodoxy to the pagan Zyrians. And the Russian monks who brought the Church even more eastward, eventually establishing a network of missions across Siberia and along the entire Pacific Rim: in China (1686), Alaska (1794), Japan (1861), and Korea (1898).  While the Church in Alaska was growing, immigrants were arriving in the rest of North America. In the 1860s a parish was established in San Francisco by Serbians, Russians and Greeks. Parishes were also established across the territory of the United States. At the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century, the headquarters of the North American Diocese was moved to San Francisco and then to New York. At this time there were great waves of Orthodox immigrants from Central, Eastern, and Southern Europe, and the Middle East. But, regardless of ethnic background, they were all united in a single [[diocese]], or [[jurisdiction]], which was under the Russian Orthodox Church.  In 1917, the Bolshevik Revolution brought communication between the churches in North America and Russia to an almost complete halt. In the early 1920s, Patriarch [[Tikhon of Moscow]] directed all Russian Orthodox churches outside of Russia to govern themselves autonomously until regular communication and travel could be resumed. (He died in 1925, and was glorified as a [[saint]] by the [[Church of Russia|Russian Orthodox Church]] in 1989.) Shortly thereafter, at a Council of all hierarchs and clergy and parish delegates, it was decided that the Church in North America could no longer maintain strict administrative ties with the Church in Russia, especially since Patriarch Tikhon had been arrested. Also the loss of financial support from the fallen empire added to the diocese’s problems. At that time, parishes which had been part of a single , multi-ethnic, North American [[diocese]] organized ten separate dioceses and placed themselves under various other [[mother churcheschurche]]s, giving rise to the current situation of multiple , ethnically-based, overlapping , jurisdictions in North America(three Russian, two Arab, as well as Serbian, Albanian, Romanian, Ukrainian, and Carpatho-Russian).  In the early 1960s, the Metropolia (as it was then known) resumed communication with the Patriarch of Moscow, and in 1970 full communion was restored. At that time, the Patriarch of Moscow officially granted the OCA [[autocephaly]], or self-governing administrative status. The OCA's autocephaly is not currently recognized by all other autocephalous Orthodox Churches, including the [[Church of Constantinople]]. Churches that do recognize its autocephaly are mainly those in former Communist lands (most of which had thus come under the influence of the Church of Russia), including the [[Church of Russia]], the [[Church of Bulgaria]], the [[Church of Poland]], the [[Church of Georgia]], and the [[Church of the Czech Lands and Slovakia]]. According to apologists for OCA autocephaly, it is common for recognition of autocephaly to be recognized belatedly; however, according to opponents, the granting of autocephaly to the former Metropolia, being a recent group out of communion with Moscow, was not justified. But the granting of autocephaly, was more of recognizing reality, that its North American Diocese was governing itself, and was indeed an autocephalous Church.