Jane, I think your misunderstanding on this has less to do with the wording of Agile Parry, and more to do with you not understanding the difference between a Bonus Action and an Action. That's understandable, 5E reuses a lot of words unncessarily when describing entirely different concepts, but you should take a read at this section of Chapter 9: Combat in the PHB.

Your Turn

On your turn, you can move a distance up to your speed and take one action. You decide whether to move first or take your action first. Your speed — sometimes called your walking speed — is noted on your character sheet.

The most common actions you can take are described in the "Actions in Combat" section later in this chapter. Many class features and other abilities provide additional options for your action.

The "Movement and Position" section later in this chapter gives the rules for your move.

You can forgo moving, taking an action, or doing anything at all on your turn. If you can't decide what to do on your turn, consider taking the Dodge or Ready action, as described in "Actions in Combat."

Bonus Actions

Various class features, spells, and other abilities let you take an additional action on your turn called a bonus action. The Cunning Action feature, for example, allows a rogue to take a bonus action. You can take a bonus action only when a special ability, spell, or other feature of the game states that you can do something as a bonus action. You otherwise don't have a bonus action to take.

You can take only one bonus action on your turn, so you must choose which bonus action to use when you have more than one available.

You choose when to take a bonus action during your turn, unless the bonus action's timing is specified, and anything that deprives you of your ability to take actions also prevents you from taking a bonus action.

You seem to be reading "Bonus Action" as "a bonus thing you can do as part of your action." That's not what a Bonus Action is. If an Attack Action is a box that holds some number of attacks (depending on whether you have the Extra Attack feature), then your Bonus Action is an entirely seperate box that holds some number of other attacks (depending on whether you're using regular Martial Arts or Flurry of Blows). You don't get to open the Bonus Action box unless you've already opened the Attack Action box on that turn, but that doesn't mean they are the same box. 

Agile Parry cares about what kind of attacks were in the first Attack Action box, it wants one of them to be an unarmed strike. It doesn't matter what attacks are in the Bonus Action... or even if you take a Bonus Action at all. 

Quote from Lady_Jane >>

Agreed the Attack action, and the bonus action are different, luckily as per the "Agile Parry" description only a part of the Attack action is needed to make it work which under the "Martial Arts" section of the monk the bonus action/unarmed attack/strike is. If you so choose, the bonus action/attack made following the Attack action is apart of the initial action.

Just because something has been exhaustively covered, or its something everybody knows doesn't make it truth necessarily.

If one's bonus action/attack for an unarmed strike couldn't be used to activate "agile parry" following the initial Attack action, then imho in the description of the ability it would/should state something like, "while making an Attack action only, on your turn..." however it does not. Instead, in the description of the feature it states, "if you make an unarmed strike as part of the Attack action on your turn..." "As part" of the Attack action being the key in the description. Take care.

 again they don't need the world only because the Attack action unarmed strikes are different than the BA unarmed strike.  So saying that you must make an unarmed strike as part of the attack action means that only unarmed strikes made during the action phase of your turn activate agile parry.  A BA unarmed strike is not made as part of the attack action it is made in addition to the action,  that is why they don''t need the word; only.

Again you say BAs and Actions are separate yet claim that they would need to specify only action if they meant only action but acknowledge that actions and BAs are separate

IF they wanted the parry feature to activate on any unarmed strike the feature would have written "When you make unarmed strike on your turn"

I have reviewed your answer, an still I keep coming back to the Attack action, and bonus action being very much linked, and the bonus action/attack being a part of the initial attack. Fore, you can't make an attack using only a bonus action/attack unless specifically stated in a feature/spell etc. which I believe "martial arts" enables thus triggering "agile parry".

I do appreciate your points/tone, as I feel others that have responded have done so with a bit of spice if you will.

They absolutely are linked, you're correct that you can't make that Bonus Action attack without also making an Attack Action first. But if an analogy helps, think of it like this: you have to put on your shoes before you go for a jog, but that doesn't mean that going for a jog is a "part of" putting on your shoes, or that putting your shoes is a "part of" your jog. They're two related actions, but not the same action.

And you're also right that you can weave your Attack Action and your Bonus Action back and forth, in a way that can be confusing to an outside observer to tell when you're doing one or the other. If you had two attacks in your Attack Action due to being a level 5 monk with Extra Attack, it would totally be okay to do Attack Action-Attack 1->Bonus Action-Martial Arts unarmed strike->Attack Action-Attack 2. In that sense, it would really seem like the Bonus was "part of" "the attack." But it nevertheless is not part of the "Attack action."

Even when your Bonus Action is related to your Attack Action, and even when your Attack Action is interrupted by and sandwiches your Bonus Action (or a Reaction, or a move), the Attack Action is still tracked separately from the related Bonus Action/Reaction/Move. 

Thank you for time.

Thank you for your time, and I did appreciate the analogy :). I will further review my stance.

Lol, I have repeated myself, and that's a fair example.

Quote from Lady_Jane >>

Thank you for your time, and I did appreciate the analogy :). I will further review my stance.

Your stance is wrong; there's nothing to review. This isn't even an edge case... you are 100% entirely wrong, and I cannot stress that enough. I still don't say this to insult you, but I do mean to shock you out of the bubble your logic is coming from. Your stance is rooted in a fundamental lack of understanding on the core rules of Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition, and it is entirely incorrect.

Please review Chapter 9 of the PHB. CC has already tried explaining that an "Action" is not the same thing as a "Bonus action". What you need to understand is that the Attack action is a specific action. It is self-contained; it is nothing except the Attack action, and no other thing is the Attack action.

You seem to have the misconception that you're combining the Attack action and bonus action as a "full-round action" like 3.5e or Pathfinder. That's wrong. There is no "full-round action". 

Chilax, I believe the day was won. Lay down your swords and let them be plowshares.

After further review, I have concluded that I was wrong, and concede my initial position. Thank you to everyone who had something constructive to say, but especially to you (CC) for showing patience, and a willingness to describe things differently, and in positive manner throughout. Also, shout out to IamSposta for making an excellent point (an making me laugh) related to the Flat-Earthers comment, as well as successfully realizing/guessing the debate had ended.

Despite this unfortunate error on my part, and imho a somewhat less useful/versatile feature of the Kensei monk subclass, I fully intend on enjoying my current monk/cleric build, and may report back from time to time on my progress where applicable. Take care all.

Sometimes an enemy can't be reached or maybe could be more vulnerable to a projectile based attack

Would it be possible to use Patient Defense and still be able to use Agile Parry?  Or must you make an unarmed attack exclusively? 

Quote from Deatheod >>

Would it be possible to use Patient Defense and still be able to use Agile Parry?  Or must you make an unarmed attack exclusively? 

 Agile parry requires an unarmed strike as part of the Attack action. You can do that and still spend 1 Ki to use Patient Defense as a Bonus action. 

Edit: so if you were 5th level+ and had Longsword as a Kensei weapon you could take the Attack action and make an unarmed strike with one of your attacks and an attack with your Longsword with your extra attack and use your bonus action to spend 1 Ki and patient defense. 

I came to the same conclusion.  5th level is when, from a strictly practical sense, Agile Parry really begins to pay off.  Thanks for the reply.