(The Lion) — Larry Sanger, co-founder of the online encyclopedia Wikipedia, announced he will be confirmed into the conservative Anglican Church of North America (ACNA) as part of his transition from self-described religious skeptic to follower of Jesus Christ.
In a blog post earlier this year on his personal website, Sanger wrote, “It is finally time for me to confess and explain, fully and publicly, that I am a Christian,” adding, “I am called to ‘Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature.’”
Raised in a conservative Lutheran church, Sanger lost his faith in his teen years after recurring philosophical questions he raised about God went unanswered.
“At some point in my late teens, I remember calling up a pastor … to ask skeptical questions,” Sanger recalled. “I really needed help thinking these things through. But the pastor had no clear or strong answers.”
Instead, he brushed off Sanger’s questions and treated him with contempt. “The damage was quickly done,” wrote Sanger, “being met with hostile unconcern by a person I expected to be, well, pastoral confirmed me in my disbelief.”
A more than 35-year journey followed of questioning and weighing the arguments for and against God’s existence, until Sanger ultimately realized he could not dismiss the existence of God. He eventually found his way back to the Bible, where he discovered Scripture was “far more interesting and – to my shock – coherent than I was expecting.”
In early 2020, Sanger began reading the Gospels – Matthew, Mark, Luke and John – and found himself admitting, “I now believe in God.”
However, he described his conversion to Christianity as somewhat anti-climactic: “I never had a mind-blowing conversion experience. I approached faith in God slowly and reluctantly – with great interest, yes, but filled with confusion and consternation.”
After narrowing his church options to the ACNA, the Evangelical Free Church of America, and the General Association of Regular Baptist Churches, he finally landed on the Anglican denomination, he wrote in August.
As reported by the Christian Post, “Sanger explained why he decided to join the Anglican Church, noting, ‘I attended a local ACNA church last Sunday, and I absolutely loved the liturgy, which I found deeply spiritual, as well as the fellowship.’ He added, ‘It helps that the liturgy is all on overhead projectors, and the acoustics are such that I could actually hear the sermon if I turned my hearing aids all the way up.’”
