What do you guys mean when referring to a megachurch?

[LG Gone Wild]

I'm Catholic, so all I know is ...church. Sometimes the local one is small, other times it's large. It all depends on the number residents.

[strider]

A big church has hundreds, but a megachurch has thousands. One example would be Willow Creek in Barrington, Illinois.

[Ellie]

has over 2000 people attending each week.

[Karen in CO]

It has 5 to 7 thousand people each service and runs two or more services on Sunday. It is BIG. They have GIANT screens so that you can actually see who is speaking. I am from a small town with fewer than 5 thousand people in the whole town. Mega-churches are BIG.

[Amy in Orlando]

It has 5 to 7 thousand people each service and runs two or more services on Sunday. It is BIG. They have GIANT screens so that you can actually see who is speaking. I am from a small town with fewer than 5 thousand people in the whole town. Mega-churches are BIG.

This is what I think of, too, when I think of a mega-church. BIG. The ones around here have Starbuks type cafes, bookstores, gyms, anything you can imagine. It's really amazing.

We're Catholic as well and our parish as over 2000 members. You rarely see most of them except on holidays and through Holy Week.

[KristineIN]

I just wanted to comment, someone mentioned they belong to a small church of 300 people. To me, that is not small, we attend a church of about 80 and that's a small church. It actually was two smaller congregations (about 50 & 30 members) that recently joined forces (our pastor took over their pastoring after theirs quit) We are praying that we grow some now that we have a building (we had a pastor they had a building, worked out well, but we're working on other issues!)

Kristine

[mcconnellboys]

There are some churches in this area that have 5000-8000 members attending. They are like airport terminals!

Regena

[*anj*]

A few months ago dh and I read a really interesting study on this subject. The research was done by The Hartford Institute for Religion Research. They defined megachurch as follows:
The term megachurch generally refers to any Protestant congregation with a sustained average weekly attendance of 2000 persons or more in its worship services.

They purposely left Catholic churches out of the equation for various reasons, which they state here on their website:
http://hirr.hartsem.edu/megachurch/definition.html

We found it to be really very interesting.

[LG Gone Wild]

That is interesting. I was under the impression that megachurches are new thing, something that may have started in the late '90s. It's funny that they seem to like warm weather!

[Night Elf]

My last church was a megachurch and we loved it! At that time, 3 years ago, the membership was 14,000+. There were always so many things going on that we were at church several days a week. I loved being a part of Awana, children's choir and Sunday School because there were just so many kids! The church is also home to a rather large homeschooling ministry that offers weekly classes. That was the most active I've been in church ever. And then we moved away. And with each year, my faith has dwindled. Now I wouldn't even be comfortable there anymore. Bummer. It was tons of fun.

[Nancy in MI]

According to the Hartford Institute for Religion Research, a megachurch is usually defined by these characteristics:

2,000 or more people in attendance at weekly worship

A charismatic, authoritative senior minister

A very active, 7-day-a-week congregational community

A multitude of social and outreach ministries

Acomplex organizational structure, resembling a business

According to this, I guess the church we attend would be considered a megachurch. Although, while I would consider our senior pastor to be very authoritative (to me, meaning he is *very* knowledgeable about the Bible), I don't know about his being charismatic. What does that mean??:confused:

Nancy

[*anj*]

Although, while I would consider our senior pastor to be very authoritative (to me, meaning he is *very* knowledgeable about the Bible), I don't know about his being charismatic. What does that mean??:confused:

Nancy

It refers to a person who has a magnetic personality, a person to whom others are attracted and who easily gains influence over others based on his or her persona.

[Nancy in MI]

It refers to a person who has a magnetic personality, a person to whom others are attracted and who easily gains influence over others based on his or her persona.

I guess it's the part about "easily gains influence over others" part that creeps me out!

He's a nice guy, and very knowledgeable about the Bible, but based on this, I guess I wouldn't call him charismatic!

Thanks for defining that, by the way. I've always wondered what that meant.

:)
Nancy