My impressions of a mega-church.

[lizaanne]

They don’t feel like Church for a number of reasons:

• They are not a Church (see the recent document from the Vatican explaining the distinction)
• Christ is not present in the tabernacle - how can it be Church without Jesus there?
• They are more concerned about what “feels good” to them than what Christ actually taught his disciples - therefore there is much lacking spiritually in such a place
  I don’t have to have glitz and spotlights, PowerPoint and drums to be with God. All I have to do is kneel before my priest and open my mouth and say Amen.

I’m sure that Maximilian Kolbe wasn’t complaining about not having ten day care rooms when he was saying Mass in the concentration camp. He was just happy to bring Christ to the people. It really doesn’t need to be any more complicated than that. Those who make it so are clouding their lives with so much unnecessary garbage that I wonder how they can even know Christ at all.

And yes - I attended a Willow Creek style worship for almost a year with my ex-fiancé. Mass on Saturday night, his place of worship on Sunday. I was so completely not impressed. I kept wondering - when do we worship God or learn about Jesus?

~Liza

 

[Sarabande]

They gave inspiring sermons, they organized a lot of “stuff” to do as a community. However, my mother in law, being in the administrative department, was able to see behind the scenes. Basically the head pastor was only interested in building the largest mega-church he could. But it wasn’t so he could reach masses and save their souls. No, rather, he had an intense desire to be as big as Saddleback and, no doubt, as famous as Rick Warren. EVERYTHING was about the money and how to generate more of it.

I think we can run across people like this in any denomination, perhaps not with the same vice as the above pastor, but with vices maybe just as bad. Having worked for a few Catholic pastors, I’ve seen really wonderful ones and bad ones. And I’ve heard the same with colleagues who work at churches of different denominations. All the same, I would be outraged at that pastor if I was a member of his church and found out what his whole agenda was.

In regards to the concept of megachurch, I personally don’t understand it. I’ve seen two really large ones - one in NJ and one in PA. The one in NJ actually used to be a Walmart or something like that. It’s not what I consider deep worship for me, but it’s obvious that other people do.

I recently had a talk with my father regarding the belief systems of non-denominational Christians, as his brother and family are non-denom and actually tried to suck my father and mother into it once many years ago when we were still kids. (Let me stress, my parents never left the Church.) I asked him what the draw was. He told me at the time, life was extremely hard for them financially and a myriad of other things. Their faith at the time wasn’t that strong although they always took us to mass every Sunday and made sure we got as good of a religious education as we could. At this point, my uncle saw the vulnerability of my parents and took the opportunity. My Dad said, at first, their belief system is so simple and elementary that it was something he thought he needed within his complex life. It was easy and superficial But for my father, who is an intellectual, a very deep person and very rational, he quickly realized the superficiality of it and knew it wasn’t enough for him, so he began to focus more on his Catholic faith. Perhaps not all non-denom churches are like that, but that was the experience of my father and my own, as I grew up knowing this part of family and what their system of beliefs were. Also, this uncle and aunt have switched about 3 or 4 different churches since they left the Church and became non-demon. They just keep leaving one until they find one that they agree with.

 

[ForwardProgress]

Here in Baton Rouge, there is a large mega-type Baptist community called Istrouma Baptist Church…Their sign looks like this:

Exciting!
Istrouma^Baptist Church. (the word ‘exciting’ is in red letters at an angle with the little insert into this sentence symbol).

Another bilboard on the way to work has a young man and a young woman on it. The young man is pointing at you in the "hey, how are ya!’ pose…the text on the sign says.

Come experience the Excitement!
Miracle Place Church

These two examples should be very telling. The bilboard one irks me a lot as it doesn’t even mention Jesus.

Our church has a very small bilboard in town. It says
Liturgical Worship
Apostolic something or other
Sacred something or other (I forget)

Nothing exciting about it.

There are also a few young people here that go to another community, called ‘Healing Place’. Very trendy. Has lots of nifty graphics and stuff, fancy dancy website. They too, helped out a bunch for Katrina. BUT…I hear them talk about their experience and all they talk about is how fun it is, and cute guys, and how good it makes them feel.

The reason they have money? Their people give more. Most give the 10% before taxes. I ga-ron-tee that if us Caths gave that much (I know I don’t) we would be as fancy as they are.

 

[puzzleannie]

However, I was taken aback. This is a church? There was a Scripture verse written on the front, and a skinny little cross positioned somewhere on the premises. Other than that, there was not one religious image. (Just a campy mural of a cartoon Jesus playing with cartoon kids in the nursery.) The “sanctuary” is a gray and black auditorium with a full band on stage and a big screen. No altar, no candles, nothing that would indicate that this is a Christian church. I assume from the Protestant services I have attended that they mostly play music and listen to preaching.
.

had a similar reaction visiting such a place with a relative on vacation (she needed a ride and I got a free lunch out of it, having been to Mass on Saturday evening).

what struck me was the ornate chairs arranged on the raised state (what we would call the sanctuary) for all the senior pastors or worship leaders. the band and choirs (3) was on a separate stage. there was no altar, but a very expensive ornate podium. the kicker was the main preacher (there were several, each interspersed with appeals for money, there were 3 collections, plus donations boxes all over the place). The sermon was about not accepting the authority of men but only of the scripture, with some heavy hitting against the Catholic hierarchy and the papacy, yet, these men, who did wear robes to preach, in expensive suits (with expensive cowboy boots, this was Texas after all) at least 12 in these gold-bedecked thrones.

 

[Ahimsa]

The real “Church” in a mega-church is actually not the Sunday service, which is often geared towards newbies. The real Church occurs in the small-groups, of about 12 people, who meet on a regular basis for prayer, study, community service, and who keep each other accountable in their daily lives. You haven’t really seen a mega-church until you’ve seen (or been a part of) the small-groups. That’s where the real action is.

 

[CarrieH]

“Come experience the Excitement!
Miracle Place Church”

One of our local happy-clappy churches put up a billboard along the highway which reads, “No choir, no organ, no boring hymns!” as it shows a praise band with a light show, looking like something one would see at a nightclub.

Gee, since when is a well-sung Palestrina motet boring? And what could possibly be tedious about the Widor “Toccata” played on the organ? Different strokes for different folks, I guess…

 

[colliric]

One of our local happy-clappy churches put up a billboard along the highway which reads, “No choir, no organ, no boring hymns!” as it shows a praise band with a light show, looking like something one would see at a nightclub.

Gee, since when is a well-sung Palestrina motet boring? And what could possibly be tedious about the Widor “Toccata” played on the organ? Different strokes for different folks, I guess…

I find Choral music to range from Good to totally boring… But that’s just me… I go to Latin Rite mass at a Catholic Charismatic Renewal Parish. CCR is Catholic to the core, but there’s a sense of “cell groups” and things like that in our parishes that we’ve “borrowed” from the pentacostal protestants including all their good music that doesn’t say anything anti-catholic and the fact we hold hands during the “Our Father”.

CCR is in many ways the Catholic response to Pentacostal and megachurch churches and I love attending mass there, there’s always a sense of energy and exitiment at CCR, the music is intense… especially the musical renditions of the Latin Rite mass responses(I love the “allelu, allelu, allelu, alleluia! Praise ye the lord!” before the Gospel reading) and the best thing? It’s totally Catholic… Totally and energetically so.

P.S Thank you John Paul 2nd for supporting and nourishing our existence.

 

[colliric]

Oh and i dislike Megachurches too.

In Australia we have the huge Hillsong megachurch that has that gigantic music recording arm. They make nice music that I occasionally enjoy, but I think the title of Pastor Brian Houston’s books says it all about their church…

“For This Cause”, “Get A Life”, “You Can Change the Future”,“You Need More Money”, “How to Build Great Relationships”, “How to Live a Blessed Life”, “How to Make Wise Choices”, “How to Flourish in Your Life” and “How to :Live in Health & Wholeness”…

I honestly believe the Prosperity gospel is the gospel of the Anti-Christ, the gospel of Mammon… It’s all about “me, me, me, me, me… How can I get god to do this, how can I get god to do that”. I’m sick of it, and “The Message” book that oft accompanies it.

I took real offense once at their Television program that is on after the Sunday broadcast of www.mfyah.com.au(Great Programming Channel 10! seriously they should put some room between the programs… they are so diametrically opposed) and sent them an angry e-letter because Pastor Brian Houston led his young naive group to laugh at the expense of a deceased Holy man, Pope JP2, and the security measures that the Vatican had for him. I promptly sent him an e-mail asking if someone had ever attempted to assassinate him before. It wasn’t a nice thing to say for sure, but it needed to be asked of him and his crew, the program was disgustingly offensive, insulting and anti-catholic.

 

[Cat]

One of the problems with megachurches is that they suck the life out of small churches.

A “small” church has about 100-150 attendees and members, one or maybe two pastors, and a small staff including a secretary and a maintainance person.

These little churches become very close-knit families. They manage to give enough money to support their pastor(s) and small staff, and to provide programs for themselves and their youth and children. They do a lot of good.

Of course they’re not Catholic. But as the Catechism says, these non-Catholic ecclesial communities do have a portion of the truth of the Gospel and therefore are under the “umbrella” of the Catholic church.

And as Jesus said, If they aren’t against us, they’re for us.

Then along comes the exciting megachurch, and several families leave the small church. This makes a major impact on a small church. Either the remaining members have to pick up the financial loss by giving more, or the pastors and staff have to cut their salaries.

Then more families leave, and something has to give. Often the maintainance man and/or the secretary will be reduced to part-time status, which may or may not work out for them. So that work has to be picked up by the pastor or his wife.

Eventually so many families leave that the little church is in big trouble. Without the money, they can’t start up any new programs that might woo in some new attendees. And with a reduction in staff, the pastors become overworked and burned out.

And then the little church closes, and a family is gone.

I think this is very sad. I personally think that megachurches should have the integrity to ask their visitors, “Are you already attending a church? Is there anything “wrong” or “sinful” about that church? Is your church preaching the Gospel of Christ? If so, then go back to that church. We are looking for converts, new believers, not old sheep.”

I wonder what this approach would do to the “mega” of the megachurch?

BUT–again, the megachurches do a lot of good and have their place. One pastor of a “small church” that I talked to said that many people attend a megachurch after they have been burned or hurt by their church. They do so precisely because of the lack of pressure and the freedom to come as they are. This pastor said that megachurches are a great place to hide out and HEAL. Then, according to this pastor, many of these people return to a smaller church or to the traditional church (e.g., Catholic). And he said that we, the churches (or the Catholic Church) need to be READY for these megachurch “graduates.”

We saw this exact scenario in our RCIA class two years ago. I won’t go into details to protect the family’s identity, but in brief, they were burned to coals by a traditional church, ran off to a megachurch, were happy for two years, then became dissatisfied with the lack of “depth,” and decided to return to the Catholic Church. And our parish was ready for them. They’re a great family–a great testimony of God’s healing power.

I think the pastor that I talked to is very wise and that we would do well do listen to him and follow his advice. Yes, we wish people would “heal” in the Catholic Church instead of a megachurch. Many of you can’t fathom why people prefer rock music to chant or a videotape to a live priest or a drama/musical instead of Holy Communion. But that’s the reality. We may as well work with reality instead of railing against it. JMO.

 

[colliric]

One of the problems with megachurches is that they suck the life out of small churches.

A “small” church has about 100-150 attendees and members, one or maybe two pastors, and a small staff including a secretary and a maintainance person.

These little churches become very close-knit families. They manage to give enough money to support their pastor(s) and small staff, and to provide programs for themselves and their youth and children. They do a lot of good.

Of course they’re not Catholic. But as the Catechism says, these non-Catholic ecclesial communities do have a portion of the truth of the Gospel and therefore are under the “umbrella” of the Catholic church.

And as Jesus said, If they aren’t against us, they’re for us.

Then along comes the exciting megachurch, and several families leave the small church. This makes a major impact on a small church. Either the remaining members have to pick up the financial loss by giving more, or the pastors and staff have to cut their salaries.

Then more families leave, and something has to give. Often the maintainance man and/or the secretary will be reduced to part-time status, which may or may not work out for them. So that work has to be picked up by the pastor or his wife.

Eventually so many families leave that the little church is in big trouble. Without the money, they can’t start up any new programs that might woo in some new attendees. And with a reduction in staff, the pastors become overworked and burned out.

And then the little church closes, and a family is gone.

I think this is very sad. I personally think that megachurches should have the integrity to ask their visitors, “Are you already attending a church? Is there anything “wrong” or “sinful” about that church? Is your church preaching the Gospel of Christ? If so, then go back to that church. We are looking for converts, new believers, not old sheep.”

I wonder what this approach would do to the “mega” of the megachurch?

BUT–again, the megachurches do a lot of good and have their place. One pastor of a “small church” that I talked to said that many people attend a megachurch after they have been burned or hurt by their church. They do so precisely because of the lack of pressure and the freedom to come as they are. This pastor said that megachurches are a great place to hide out and HEAL. Then, according to this pastor, many of these people return to a smaller church or to the traditional church (e.g., Catholic). And he said that we, the churches (or the Catholic Church) need to be READY for these megachurch “graduates.”

We saw this exact scenario in our RCIA class two years ago. I won’t go into details to protect the family’s identity, but in brief, they were burned to coals by a traditional church, ran off to a megachurch, were happy for two years, then became dissatisfied with the lack of “depth,” and decided to return to the Catholic Church. And our parish was ready for them. They’re a great family–a great testimony of God’s healing power.

I think the pastor that I talked to is very wise and that we would do well do listen to him and follow his advice. Yes, we wish people would “heal” in the Catholic Church instead of a megachurch. Many of you can’t fathom why people **prefer rock music **to chant or a videotape to a live priest or a drama/musical instead of Holy Communion. But that’s the reality. We may as well work with reality instead of railing against it. JMO.

In the CCR, Worship music is used and used effectivly(It is not part of mass, but comes before it, except for the responsive music). The best way to evangelise these people is to reach them on their level… show them the CCR and it will perhaps help them slowly come into the Catholic Faith without having to give up their rock music or cell group atmosphere. Then perhaps later on, once they are already well and truly Catholic, they will learn or become interested in a less liberated version of the Latin Rite Mass and become standard latin rite catholics.

The CCR might help them realize that the church is far from rigid or “boring”… in fact it may help them realize just how beautiful the Catholic Eucharist actually is.

 

[pnachazel]

The mega church in our area has the ability to bring in people that may normally not go to church. Our priest has the philosophy that we need to make our church more inviting for the people from this mega church who eventually want a fuller understanding of the bible and christianity.

Going to a church and seeing Desperate Housewife clips isn’t for me or my family, but for some people any church is a step in the right direction. Let’s pray that these churches could be a “springboard” for people to want to look deeper into their beliefs.