The Community of the Resurrection is an Anglican religious community for men. It was founded in 1892 by Charles Gore with Walter Howard Frere (1863–1938, later Bishop of Truro) and four others.
The community lives at the House of the Resurrection in Mirfield, West Yorkshire. Its rule is an attempt to create a communal life in which individual talents are given scope to develop. Members of the community commonly have the postnominal "CR".
From the date of the foundation until 1945 Members of the Community took only an annually renewable promise, the founders being opposed to vows. With the founding group safely dead, the Community began to drift away from its original intention of being bound by a 'permanent but voluntary' commitment. For some, this did not feel like the 'real thing' and they wanted vows. From 1945 a single vow was introduced 'to remain in the Community of the Resurrection for life living according to its Rule and Constitution'. Under the influence of newer members, the Community has very recently begun to style itself in imitation of monks of the Benedictine Order, taking the vows of stability, conversion of life and obedience (though in CR these vows are simple, not solemn). It will be many years before a majority of the Community has taken these vows.
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CR has had an influence in excess of its numbers in the development of the Anglican Church in South Africa, especially in the ministry of Raymond Raynes CR and Trevor Huddleston CR in Sophiatown and in the influence of Huddleston and the Community of the Resurrection on Desmond Tutu. The existence of St John's College, (Johannesburg) and its ethos are also almost solely due to its founding fathers; Bishop James Okey Nash, Thomson, Alston, Hill and at least eleven others, all of whom were community members. It has been a role model for many Southern African schools.
The College of the Resurrection, Mirfield, was the first theological college in the Church of England to admit ordinands irrespective of their means. For a while, the Community also managed Codrington College in Barbados and founded and directed St Peter's College for ordination candidates in South Africa.
Other influential members have included Robert Hugh Benson, John Neville Figgis, Edward Keble Talbot, Timothy Rees, Lionel Thornton, Martin Jarrett-Kerr, Harry Williams, Geoffrey Beaumont, Benedict Green, Anselm Genders, and Robert Mercer.
In recent years declining numbers have caused the community's withdrawal from all other places than Mirfield where, for the first time in its history, the entire community now lives. The distinct change of emphasis toward a more monastic style of life means that most of the work of the community is now conducted at Mirfield where the atmosphere of prayer and quiet is much in demand. The Mirfield Centre for local ministerial outreach is a valued product of this concentration of resources.
The Community cooperates with the Benedictine St. Matthias' Abbey in Trier, Germany.[1]
Dietrich Bonhoeffer visited CR Mirfield in the 1930s and, as a result, introduced the recitation of parts of Psalm 118 as part of the daily prayer of the seminary for the Confessing Church.