Drinking beers, company and church come together (8)
I believe the answer is:
coalesce
'come together' is the definition.
(thesaurus)
'drinking beers company and church' is the wordplay.
'drinking' is an insertion indicator.
'beers' becomes 'ales' (I've seen this before).
'company' becomes 'co' (abbreviation).
'and' is a charade indicator (letters next to each other).
'church' becomes 'ce' (abbreviation for Church of England).
'co'+'ce'='coce'
'ales' put within 'coce' is 'COALESCE'.
(Other definitions for coalesce that I've seen before include "Unite" , "Come together in one mass" , "Grow together, amalgamate" , "Combine and form one whole, as political parties may" , "Run together" .)