Our Story
The HISTORY
The Church Army was founded in England in 1882 by the Rev. Wilson Carlile, who banded together an orderly army of soldiers, officers and a few working men and women, whom he and others trained to act as Church of England evangelists among the outcasts and criminals of the Westminster slums.
As a curate in the parish of St Mary Abbott, Kensington, Carlile had experimented with unorthodox forms of Christian meetings and witness, going to where coachmen, valets and others would take their evening stroll and holding open air services, persuading onlookers to say the Scripture readings, and training working people to preach. Previous experience had convinced Carlile that the moral condition of the lowest classes of the people called for new and aggressive action on the part of the Christian Church and that this work was most effectively done by lay people of the same class as those whom it was desired to reach.
The History
As the work grew, a training institution for evangelists was started in Oxford with F S Webster as Principal, but soon moved (1886) to London, where, in Bryanston Street near Marble Arch, the headquarters of the army was established. Marie Carlile, Wilson Carlile's sister, was a frail woman who left a life of elegance for the tough, austere life of training women in 1888, followed by the first "Rescue Shelter" for women in 1891, and continued in the mission for fifty years.
Today, Church Army USA is a society of trained and commissioned evangelists in the Anglican Church. Their aim and purpose is winning persons to Christ, by providing the Church with trained, disciplined and socially concerned evangelists who shall: reach the least, the last, and the lost; equip others to “do the work of an evangelist” and further evangelize by ministering where others cannot. Church Army is at work in Pennsylvania, Missouri, West Virginia, Texas, Florida, and Connecticut to bring the help of Christ and the comfort of the gospel.
JOIN US
Are you willing to live out the Good News of Jesus through words and action?
Do you want to help the church bring the gospel its community?
Would you like to order your life following the example of Jesus?
Sign up for the Certificate of Evangelism offered in conjunction with Trinity School for Ministry.
The Certificate requirements are found here.
Please complete the application form
and registration form today.
If you are interested in becoming a CAUSA Officer, click the link here to fill out the application.