The Myth of the Extra-Special Church

My time inside a congregation that seemed like the epicenter of God's work.

I’ve been attending church most of my life. But I’ve only ever been part of one extra-special church.

It was Church of the Resurrection, an Anglican congregation in Wheaton, Illinois. It started as an Episcopal plant in the 1950s, then split from The Episcopal Church (TEC) in 1993 under the leadership of the charismatic (in both senses of the word) William Beasley. Beasley was replaced as pastor in 1999 by the equally charismatic Stewart Ruch. “Rez” later joined the Anglican renewal movement, composed of evangelicals concerned about TEC’s liberal drift, especially on issues of women’s ordination and same-sex marriage.

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In 2008, a thousand worshipers gathered in Wheaton to inaugurate what would become the Anglican Church in North America (ACNA). Someone at that meeting sounded a shofar — a trumpet that, for the Israelites, meant either a call to war or a proclamation of freedom. For Robert Duncan, the ACNA’s first archbishop, the shofar signaled both: a war against TEC unor…