Affiliate Professor of Theology
PhD, University of Notre Dame
MAR, Yale Divinity School
BA, St. Olaf College
Dr. Wells grew up in Grand Rapids, Michigan, in the environs of Calvin College, supplemented by frequent side trips to the United Kingdom, and learned to love ecumenism from his parents. During college, Wells backed his way into theology via Great Books, which led to work in historical theology and systematics at Yale Divinity School and the University of Notre Dame, with a particular focus on St. Augustine of Hippo, St. Thomas Aquinas, and ecclesiology.
His primary areas of research are the history of Christian doctrine, ecumenism, Anglicanism, and Roman Catholicism. He has published articles on Aquinas and ecclesiology in several journals and books and written many pieces for The Living Church and its online journal Covenant.
Dr. Wells is Director of Unity, Faith, and Order for the Anglican Communion, based in London, England. He oversees the Communion’s ecumenical relations and the work of the Inter-Anglican Standing Commission on Unity, Faith, and Order (IASCUFO). From 2009 to 2022, Wells served as executive director and publisher of the Living Church Foundation.
He and his wife, Laura, and their daughter, Elizabeth, love living in London and are amazed by God’s faithfulness in his worldwide Church, across time and space.
Wounded Church: The Ecumenical Initiation of Catholic Ecclesiology, book manuscript in progress
“The way of Anglican communion: Walking together before God” with John Bauerschmidt, Zachary Guiliano, Ephraim Radner, and George Sumner for the Communion Partners (June 2018)
“The Universal Church of the Covenant: Called and Conscripted” in Pro Communione: Theological Essays on the Anglican Covenant, ed. Benjamin Guyer (Eugene, OR: Wipf and Stock, 2012)
“Word of Love: The Sacramental Itinerary of 1 Corinthians,” Anglican Theological Review, 93/4 (2011), pp. 581-98
“Cross as Curriculum for Catholic Unity,” The Living Church (29 November 2009)
“The Singular Grace of Division’s Wound,” Ecclesiology 5/1 (2009), pp. 7-27
“Problems with the Path of Phillips Brooks: Agreeing and Disagreeing with Gillis Harp,” Journal of Anglican Studies, 6/2 (2008), pp. 213–40
“The Burden and Grace of Roman Catholic Leadership: An Anglican Response to the CDF,” Pro Ecclesia, 17/1 (2008), pp. 7–12
“Wounded in Common Mission, Called to Common Conversion: The Spiritual Basis of Communion,” Anglican Theological Review, 90/1 (2008), pp. 23–46
“The Ecumenical Burden of the Liturgy, or, the End of the Mystical Body of Christ,” The Anglican (of the General Theological Seminary), 33/2 (2004), pp. 13–18
“Aquinas and Jenson on Thinking about the Trinity” (Winner of the Harris Student Essay Competition), Anglican Theological Review, 84/2 (2002), pp. 345–82
