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Privacy Policy

Last updated: August 28, 2026

This is the privacy policy for stmichaeltampabay.org, the website of St. Michael Ukrainian Orthodox Church in Pinellas Park, Florida. We have written it in plain language because the people who visit our site, attend our Divine Liturgy, and support our parish deserve to know clearly what happens with their information.

If you have a question about anything on this page, please call the parish at 727-777-4450 or email us at st.michael.uoc.pinellas@gmail.com. We will help.

What We Collect

When you visit the website

Like most websites, ours collects a small amount of technical information automatically: the pages you visit, the kind of device and browser you use, your general location (usually at the city level, never your home address), and how you arrived at our site. We use this to learn which pages serve people well and which need improvement.

We use Google Analytics 4 for this. Google places small text files called cookies on your device that help count visitors and pages. The data is not used to identify you personally. You can opt out using the Google Analytics opt-out browser add-on, or by enabling “Do Not Track” in your browser.

We also use the Meta (Facebook) Pixel, a small piece of code that helps us understand whether people who see our parish on Facebook then come to our website. The Pixel can place cookies and may share information with Meta. If you are signed in to Facebook, Meta may associate the visit with your account under their own policy. You can control this in your Facebook ad preferences.

We use Microsoft Clarity to see how people actually move through the site: where they click, how far they scroll, and where a page leaves them stuck. Clarity places cookies, including an identifier Microsoft uses across its own services. Microsoft holds this data for its own purposes as well as ours, so it is Microsoft, not the parish, that decides what else is done with it. We do send Clarity a signal asking it not to use your visit for advertising. Their privacy statement is at privacy.microsoft.com.

We use PostHog to count pages and clicks. We never attach a name, email, or account to a visit, and PostHog’s own session recording feature is switched off. What we see there is anonymous. PostHog handles this data on our instructions rather than for its own purposes, and it is stored on servers in the United States. Their privacy policy is at posthog.com/privacy.

None of these tools start the moment you arrive. They wait until you scroll, tap, or click, or until twenty seconds have passed, whichever comes first. If you come to the site, find the service times, and leave, we most likely never see the visit at all. That is on purpose.

You can clear or block these cookies anytime in your browser. Blocking them will not stop you from using the site; it only means we do not see your visit in our analytics.

Recordings of how the site is used

We want to be plain about this rather than bury it. Microsoft Clarity records a picture of the screen as you move through our pages: mouse movement, clicks, scrolling, the pages you go to, and any place where something on the page breaks. That is closer to a silent screen recording than to a visitor count. There is no camera, no sound, and nothing that shows your face.

What is not recorded is anything you type. Text boxes, message fields, and menus are masked inside your browser before anything is sent, so what reaches Clarity is a row of dots, not your words.

We also keep recording switched off entirely on our contact pages and on the private pages the parish office uses to read your messages. Not masked there; simply not loaded at all.

We look at these recordings for one reason: to find the places where the site fails someone trying to find a service time, directions, or a way to reach Fr. Stephen.

One caution, offered honestly. A website is not a confessional, and nothing typed into a web form carries the protection of a conversation with your priest. If what you want to say is private, please call Fr. Stephen at 727-777-4450 or speak with him after the Divine Liturgy. That is always the better way.

When you contact us

If you call the parish, email Fr. Stephen, or send a message through a form on the site, we keep your message and contact details only as long as needed to respond and follow up pastorally. We do not share these messages with anyone outside the parish.

When you give a donation

We process donations through Zeffy, a fundraising platform that does not charge fees to the parish. Zeffy collects the information needed to process your payment, your name, billing address, email, and payment details, and sends a receipt to your inbox. Zeffy is the data controller for that transaction; their privacy policy is on their website.

The parish receives a record of the donation, including your name and the amount, so we can thank you, issue a year-end giving statement for your taxes, and keep our books in good order. We do not see your full card or bank details. Those stay with Zeffy and its payment processors.

Your Choices

If your browser or a privacy extension sends a Global Privacy Control signal, Microsoft Clarity will not start at all. Clarity does not respond to the older “Do Not Track” setting, so Global Privacy Control is the signal that works there. PostHog does honor “Do Not Track” where your browser still sends it.

You can also opt out one tool at a time:

Or simply write or call us, and we will delete whatever we hold about you.

Blocking any or all of this will not keep you from using the site. It only means your visit does not appear in what we look at.

What We Do Not Do

  • We do not sell, rent, or trade information about visitors, donors, or parishioners. Ever.
  • We do not share contact lists with other parishes, dioceses, or outside organizations.
  • We do not send unsolicited email. Parishioners on our distribution list have asked to be there and can leave any time by replying to a parish email or calling the office.
  • We do not knowingly collect information from children under 13.
  • We do not connect analytics to your name. To these tools you are an unnamed visitor, and we do not try to change that.

How Long We Keep Information

  • Google Analytics data is retained by Google for 14 months by default, then automatically deleted.
  • Microsoft Clarity recordings are kept for 30 days. A small sample, and any recording we mark as a favorite, may be kept for up to nine months.
  • PostHog keeps anonymous page and click counts for up to one year. Nothing in it is tied to a person.
  • The Meta Pixel cookie lasts about 90 days.
  • Email correspondence with Fr. Stephen is kept while the pastoral relationship is active and is not shared outside the parish.
  • Donation records are kept for as long as required by United States tax law, generally seven years.

Photos of Parish Life

We post photos of parish life that sometimes include children, with the consent of their parents. If you believe a photo of your child or yourself should not be on the site, please contact Fr. Stephen and we will remove it promptly.

Our site links to other Orthodox parishes, the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the USA, Zeffy, our Facebook page, and other resources. Once you leave our site, the privacy policies of those sites apply.

Changes to This Policy

If we change anything material about how we handle information, we will update the “Last updated” date at the top of this page and post a brief notice in the next monthly bulletin.

How to Reach Us

If you have a question, a concern, or a request to see or delete information we hold about you, please reach out. We respond personally.

Fr. Stephen Siniari, Parish Priest Phone: 727-777-4450 Email: st.michael.uoc.pinellas@gmail.com

St. Michael Ukrainian Orthodox Church 9201 60th St, Pinellas Park, FL 33782 stmichaeltampabay.org