That was in 1998. Then, St. Mark's was the largest attended parish in the whole Diocese of Wyoming. Now it is a church in decline. Today it is a mere shadow of its former self. A call to the church office revealed that Sunday attendance at services range from a little over 100 on a good Sunday down to the low twenties on a bad Sunday. Two services have now been consolidated into one.

While Casper is the center of the state and the largest city next to Cheyenne with a large population center, the parish became the victim of its revisionist bishop's utterances and theology, and people began to leave.

"It was General Convention 2003 that did it. People left as a result of what happened there, especially the election of V. Gene Robinson. The congregation was clearly upset," Fr. Johnson told VOL.

"The bishop held a meeting with the congregation in September of 2003 in an attempt to explain things. After General Convention the Bishop came to the parish and stated publicly at a parish meeting: "For six years I have been voting on the losing side at convention, and now that I voted for Gene Robinson, I have to tell you it feels good to be a winner."

Needless to say, he alienated many, including their money, said Johnson. "If they didn't agree with him, they were "losers". Church attendance declined. Some folks believed that if we all stuck together, we would be able to weather the storm, but there was a definite agenda by the bishop. Their hope was to get through having an interim priest, get over the bishop's remarks and have someone new who would bring it altogether. Unfortunately that never happened."

Many began to leave. "I called them together, those people who came to me personally, one-on-one, and they said they had had enough and were leaving. I said don't leave, let us meet and pray for the church in small prayer groups." Regrettably it did not work out, he told VOL.

"I learned a very hard lesson. I learned I had no way of surviving with any kind of integrity with the bishop or the parish interim, the Rev. James B. D. Corbett (he has since gone). The bishop knew I was an evangelical (I was not in-your-face) and said to me there are going to be changes at St. Mark's and Christ Church in Glenrock where I was the vicar. I knew my day was done. That was June 2005."

"The bishop had the habit of getting rid of conservatives. I was one and I saw the writing on the wall. The bishop had no tolerance for priests like me. He had an agenda; he wanted control of the congregation. I had no choice except to leave."

The church was losing hundreds of members, and for his own preservation, Fr. Johnson resigned. "I left, I had no option." Johnson looked at the various options open to him but saw no alternative with either the Anglican Communion Network or AAC. They offered him no parish. His only option was the Anglican Mission in America.

When he approached Bishop Sandy Greene, it was a no brainer. He was quickly accepted by the AMIA and within a couple of weeks I formed the Anglican Church of the Resurrection (AMiA) on South Ash Street in Casper, in a state office building. Within a year the parish climbed to nearly 200 members. "We are getting lapsed Episcopalians. Furthermore we are getting Episcopalians from three local area Episcopal churches. Many, however, are still stuck in ECUSA. They don't go to St. Mark's, but the building is beautiful and they attend at Easter and Christmas, but I know their hearts are not there, they have fallen through the cracks."

"I believe that the people of the Episcopal Church need to know what their church is doing and how far it has strayed," he told VOL.

"The interim rector, Fr. James Corbett changed the liturgy. Even though he used the '79 Prayer Book, he left out the Creed during Easter services. He was very liberal theologically and not very pastoral."

What threw Fr. Johnson right over the edge was a discovery he made about the Diocese of Wyoming and the truth about the revisionists of the Episcopal Church's homosexual agenda. "I learned the ugly truth that they no intention of ever changing. They had no intention of repenting, but they want to remain in the Anglican Communion to have validity on their terms."

"With regard to the Windsor Report, they don't give a darn." Then a bombshell blast blew him out of the water. "Just to let you know how unrepentant the Episcopal Diocese of Wyoming is on the Gay-Lesbian-Bisexual-Transgender issue and how open they are for its youth to become exposed to this lifestyle, I made the following horrible discovery."

"One day someone directed me to check into the Episcopal Diocese of Wyoming's website. I went to the "Youth" link which took me to the "HR Camp" - an outdoors camp owned and operated by the Episcopal Diocese of Wyoming. I clicked on "HR Camp" which took me to episcopalyouthworld.org. At the bottom of the page, it says "Episcopal". This site is a national site for the Episcopal Church USA. I clicked on "Gay". To my horror I found links for "Gay cruises", (Atlantis All-Gay Cruises and Resorts...customized vacations for gay and lesbian travelers to exciting destinations.) "Gay dating", "Gay Singles with muscles", "Gay sex", "Gay book club", "Gay hotel accommodation" and a host of other gay sites, none of which have anything to do with Christianity."

"I was sick and almost threw up," he told VOL. "Anybody can go to this sight, adults or children, right off the Diocesan web site. There are free memberships to find "sexy singles". I ask you, is this where we want our children going, right from the church?"

"Make no mistake about it, the Episcopal Church, especially the Diocese of Wyoming, does not want to quit the revisionist agenda. The way to push it through is by exposing children to it, and then desensitizing them."

There is a push for a new money drive in the Diocese of Wyoming, said Johnson, "It's called 'Wind on Wings'. It is billed as an effort to help collaborate for all children throughout the state. They are trying to raise $2 million dollars. Even though I am no longer a member of the diocese following my resignation, I still receive mailings asking me for money. I haven't sent kids to diocesan events, including HR Camp for years, and I would not send my children there now. I strongly urge parents not to expose their children to what the Episcopal Church is doing. Take your kids and run."

END

FOOTNOTE. Since publication of this article the following note was received from the National Episcopal Church in NY.

The referring URL was http://www.wydiocese.org/Youth/hr_camp.htm. The Diocese of Wyoming site contained a link to Episcopal Youth WORLD [http://www.episcopalyouthworld.org], a project of Province VI youth ministries which is now dormant. The website appears to have been under the project's control from April 2001 until February 2005, when the last page modification was recorded. (A copy of the last such page may be found archived here: http://web.archive.org/web/20050212122338/http://www.episcopalyouthworld.org/.)

Ownership of the domain name subsequently lapsed and was picked up by an unrelated domain purchase business, Intercosmos Media Group Inc. in New Orleans, Louisiana, which has no connections to the Episcopal Church Center or any of its offices, or with the Diocese of Wyoming or any of its ministries.

Upon being informed of the situation, the Diocese of Wyoming acted immediately to remove the incorrect link.

Additional note from Mr. Robert Turner - VOL webmaster

One of the many issues relative to maintaining a website involves maintenance of links to external sites. When the domain registration for episcopalyouthworld.org expired, it was picked up by a 3rd party who "parked" the domain at a site (www.parked.com) in an effort to generate revenue.

Thanks to one of VOL's members who provided this link which shows the original content of episcopalyouthworld:
http://web.archive.org/web/20010422100446/http://www.episcopalyouthworld.org/

One of the duties of any webmaster is to properly maintain web pages - especially links to external sites. In this case, the Diocese of Wyoming webmaster is guilty only of letting links to episcopalyouthworld grow stale. The content on the "parked" web page was certainly not created by the Diocese.

END