Amegachurch is achurch with a very large membership that also offers a variety of educational and social activities. Most megachurches areevangelical, although the term denotes a type of organization, not adenomination. Megachurches are generally defined as any Protestant Christian church that on average draws 2,000 or more people per week.
The first megachurch was established inLondon in 1861. More emerged in the 20th century, especially in the United States, and expanded rapidly through the 1980s and 1990s. In the 21st century, megachurches became widespread in the United States and a growing phenomenon in several African countries and Australia. In the late 2000s and early 2010s, they shifted away from traditional church architecture, with most newer ones havingstadium-type seating, with a few such asLakewood Church even being based in former or activearenas.[1]
The origins of the megachurch movement, with many local congregants who returned on a weekly basis, can be traced to the 19th century.[2][3] There were large churches earlier, but they were considerably rarer.
A megachurch has been defined by the Hartford Institute for Religion Research (2006) and others as any Protestant Christian church attended by at least 2,000 people in aweekend.[6][7][8][9] TheOED suggests that megachurches often include educational and social activities and are usually Protestant and Evangelical.[10] These large congregations are a significant development in Protestant Christianity.[11]
Most of these churches build their buildings in the suburbs of large cities, near major roads and highways, to be visible to as many people as possible and easily accessible by car.[12][13] Some install a largecross as decoration for believers and to signal to potential new members.[14]
A 2020 study by the Hartford Institute found that 70 percent of American megachurches had amulti-site network and an average of 7.6services per weekend.[15] The study also found that most U.S. megachurches are in Florida, Texas, California, and Georgia.[16]
Churches that gather more than 10,000 people every Sunday have been dubbedgigachurches.[17][18] In 2015, there were about 100 gigachurches in the United States.[19]
Exponential counts 270 evangelical megachurches worldwide (excluding Canada and the United States).[20] The Hartford Institute counts over 1,800 megachurches in the United States[21] and 35 in Canada.[22]
Megachurches are found in many countries ofSub-Saharan Africa, includingTanzania, Nigeria, South Africa, Ghana, Kenya, and Uganda.[23] The largest church auditorium,The Glory Dome, was inaugurated in 2018 with 100,000 seats, inAbuja, Nigeria.[24]
In 2010, the Hartford Institute's database listed more than 1,300megachurches in the United States. About 50 churches on the list had average attendance exceeding 10,000, and one had 47,000.[25] On one weekend in November 2015, around one in ten Protestant churchgoers in the U.S.—about 5 million people—attended service in a megachurch.[26] Some 3,000 individualCatholic Church parishes have 2,000 or more attendants for an average Sunday Mass, but they are not called megachurches as that is a Protestant term.[9]
In the United States, the phenomenon has more than quadrupled in the two decades to 2017.[27]
In 2007, five of the ten largest Protestant churches were in South Korea.[28] In 2007, the largest megachurch in the world by attendance was South Korea'sYoido Full Gospel Church, anAssemblies of God (Pentecostal) church, with more than 830,000 members.[28][29]
In 2005,Baptist PastorAl Sharpton criticized megachurches for focusing on "bedroom morals", statements againstsame-sex marriage andabortion, by ignoring issues ofsocial justice, such as the immorality of war and the erosion[clarification needed] ofaffirmative action.[34] Some megachurches, such as C3, have similarly been criticized for presenting the church as inclusive while hiding the fact that they are strongly against gay marriage and do not allow sexually active gay members to fully participate in the church.[35][36]
A study by the Hartford Institute published in 2020 found that 60 percent of American megachurches were members of a Christian denomination.[37] In 2018, American professorScot McKnight ofNorthern Baptist Theological Seminary criticized nondenominational megachurches for the weak external accountability relationship of their leaders, by not being members of aChristian denomination, further exposing them to abuse of power.[38]
Some megachurches and their pastors have been accused by critics of promotingprosperity theology, where the poor and vulnerable are encouraged to donate their money to the church rather than saving it, in the hopes that God will bless them with wealth.[39][40][41] This in turn increases the wealth of the pastors, with some revealed to wear designer clothing during sermons and own luxury vehicles.[42][43][44]
The 2016OWNdrama seriesGreenleaf focuses on aMemphis, Tennessee megachurch called Calvary Fellowship World Ministries, led by Bishop James Greenleaf (played byKeith David), a charismatic and strong religious leader, and his wife, "First Lady" Daisy Mae Greenleaf (played byLynn Whitfield).
One of the recurring characters in the 2016 animated sitcomBordertown, Reverend Fantastic (voiced byJohn Viener) is a charismatic religious leader who is the head of the unnamed megachurch located in Mexifornia, a city located in the border ofCalifornia andMexico which is the main setting of the series.
The popularHBO comedy-drama seriesThe Righteous Gemstones focuses primarily on The Gemstones Ministries, a church network founded and led by Dr. Eli Gemstone (played byJohn Goodman and Jake Kelley in his younger version), a charismaticSouthern pastor, Christian religious leader and televangelist who is one of the series' main characters, the founder and senior pastor of The Gemstones Ministries. In particular, the main setting of the series is the Gemstone Salvation Center, a megachurch located inNorth Charleston, South Carolina that is considered the flagship church of Gemstone Ministries and was the first church founded by Eli Gemstone.[45][46]
^Ukah, Asonzeh (2020). "Chapter 15: Sacred Surplus and Pentecostal Too-Muchness: The Salvation Economy of African Megachurches".Handbook of Megachurches. Brill Handbooks on Contemporary Religion, Volume 19. Brill. pp. 323–344.doi:10.1163/9789004412927_017.ISBN9789004412927.S2CID213645909.
^Wellman, James Jr.; Corcoran, Katie; Stockly, Kate; Ficquet, Éloi;High on God: How Megachurches Won the Heart of America, Oxford University Press, 2020, p. 212
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