Megachurches

WHERE THE DIVINE MEETS THE HUMAN

Starbucks, skate parks, IMAX screens, God’s will. Welcome to the Florida megachurch

By Shawn C. Bean

I park in Temperance, but Meekness is closer to the door. From this vantage point, about a football field away, First Baptist Church of Orlando looks like Space Mountain, except trade the latter’s Sputnik stalagmites for one simple cross near the building’s summit. I-4 is just a quarter mile away; the racket of rush hour builds like Turn Four of the Daytona 500. You’d think you were in a theme park, except the bronze Jesus by the mausoleum isn’t checking to see if you’re this tall.

Inside the chapel — no, no, no, this arena, this coliseum — there are wings and hallways leading to any number of distractions. To the left are the bookstore and the sign that reads, “All Aboard the Discipleship,” referring to the marine-themed youth center. “Dock 1” and “Dock 2” are painted on the elevators, fiberglass dolphin tails dangle from the ceiling, and a glass aquarium houses a constant stream of bubbles. Evangelical Epcot.

Back in the main rotunda is a wall of posters. Upon first glance at their contemporary graphic design, they are doppelgangers for those at the local cineplex. In one, a ring of flames accentuates the tagline, “Are You On Fire? Ignite Student Choir.” There is no MPAA rating at the bottom.

Then you enter the nerve center: a 5,000-seat auditorium that bows around the huge stage. TV cameras line every aisle. Hanging behind the 12-piece band set-up is a big-screen TV, the kind that flank Madonna while she’s on tour. Those in the upper balcony can refer to the close circuit TVs mounted on the walls. On any given Sunday, 7,000 people — half the attendance of an Orlando Magic game — will pass through the doors of First Baptist Church of Orlando.

And this is no anomaly. In nearby Winter Park, Calvary Assembly has a worship center that can seat more than 5,500. Up north, First Baptist of Jacksonville welcomes 8,000 every Sunday, and has 28,000 people on its rolls. Farther south in Fort Lauderdale is Pastor Bob Coy’s Calvary Chapel, which counts 20,000 congregants for its three weekly services. Last spring, Calvary Chapel raised a staggering $103 million in donations. The money will be used for a new 360,000-square-foot worship center. That’s a wing short of the Mall at Millenia.

These places have been dubbed “megachurches,” loosely defined as any worship center that accommodates more than 2,000 people for Sunday service. But it’s so much more than that. The trend is no longer small brick chapels and white steeples, organ hymns and tweens reciting scripture. Today, it’s a 12-piece band with saxophone and electric guitar, Jumbotrons that beam the pastor to the cheap seats, Super Bowl halftime show lighting rigs, huge parking lots with named sections (at First Baptist of Orlando, you can park in Love, Joy, Temperance, Faithfulness or Meekness), common areas with Starbucks and college campus-sized bookstores, and youth centers with skate parks. This is Florida’s new destination for religion. We are third behind Texas and California in total number of megachurches (approximately 30).

As these spiritual monoliths sprout in low-income suburbs (the only areas that can accommodate a megachurch’s land requirements; First Baptist of Orlando owns 140 acres off McLeod Road), their reputation becomes increasingly similar to any entity practicing that All-American trend of hyperexpansion. In a game of word association, most would align the megachurch with Starbucks, Wal-Mart, urban sprawl and the McMansion.

“The term ‘megachurch’ has begun to have a negative connotation,” says Dr. Mac Brunson, head pastor at First Baptist Church of Jacksonville. “And it’s been the press that have given us a bad reputation.” What are we saying about you? “The connotation is that it’s impersonal, it’s money driven, it’s entertainment oriented. That the pastors are really CEOs, not ministers.”

Like the seed sown in the field, the megachurch requires the right conditions to grow. It needs the right demographics, real estate, branding and marketing, social attitudes, and community involvement. But once in full bloom, where does the megachurch stop? Some say they’re community builders, others that they’re shaping cities in their own image. In some ways we have reverted to the Great Depression, and the traveling tent revival has pulled into town. But there are no canvas tarps or roped stakes. These institutions have concrete walls and titanium girders. They are here to stay, here to convert. The question is: are we believers?

Part I: Land of Milk and Honey

The population growth of Florida, and the variation within that growth, is the biggest factor in the megachurch’s success. Florida is now the fourth largest state in the nation, and is projected to surpass New York by 2011. According to the U.S. Census, Florida has 15 of the fastest-growing 100 counties in the nation, more than any other state. Another staggering fact: Florida, California and Texas will account for nearly one-half of the total U.S. population growth between 2000 and 2030. It should also be noted that 70 percent of the U.S. population attends church or synagogue on a weekly basis, a statistic that has not changed since the 1970s.

Why are Florida, California and Texas the fastest growing? Simple: immigration. Those three states account for huge numbers of Latin American immigrants. The immigrant population is largely a religious one, with Catholicism being the most popular. Catholics are attending megachurches in droves, but so are Protestants, Evangelicals, and Episcopalians. There is the same variety with income and race. When asked about the demographical makeup of his congregation, Dr. Brunson says, “We have blue collar and white collar families. We have a higher percentage of African Americans than the average church. There are Hispanics and Asians as well. Megachurches tend to be regional, not demographical. We draw people from all over.”

According to Steve Smith, media and communications pastor for First Baptist Church of Orlando (you know it’s big when a pastor’s title includes media and communications), Catholics are the second most populous group in the congregation. How do you woo them? “We’re less liturgical, less gothic,” says Smith. “Our message is geared to talking to the individual who lives here today. We’re not talking in lofty ideological or antiquated terms.” Many of the megachurches, like Calvary Chapel in Fort Lauderdale, are non-denominational, which attracts religious people from all backgrounds. It’s therefore no coincidence that half of the churchgoing public attends only 12 percent of the country’s churches.

But Florida’s growth also provides concerns for megachurches, particularly land and location. Finding real estate in a city’s urban core can be difficult; much like sports arenas, megachurches require lots of land for cheap, and often end up in remote and run-down parts of town. And with suburban sprawl being what it is in Florida, people can be more than an hour from the church. To alleviate that issue, Smith says the newest megachurch trend is “satellite campuses.”

“We recognize that some people might not drive 30 or 45 minutes to go to church,” says Smith. “But they might drive to a satellite location nearby.” Sunday service at a remote campus begins with live music, then links up with the home church to broadcast the sermon live via satellite.

Part II: Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger

Megachurch is not just a place for worship. It is a destination. James Twitchell, a professor of advertising at the University of Florida, is the author of Branded Nation: The Marketing of Megachurch, College Inc., and Museumworld. In the section about megachurches (the chapter’s title: “One Market Under God”), Twitchell discusses the philosophy of creating a one-stop spiritual shop.

“The megachurch often behaves like a successful mall, consolidating other frayed institutions such as school, family government, neighborhood, and even employment,” writes Twitchell. “In a sense, the megachurch mimics the Norman Rockwell town center, complete with the town square — the commons. Having people milling about is crucial.” He concludes with just how far the megachurch is willing to go to create a centralized site. “A megachurch in Longmont, Colorado, plans to develop 313 surrounding acres into residences, a community college and a senior center.”

Smith both agrees and disagrees with Twitchell. “Megachurches want to be a one-stop shop for the whole person, from education to wellness to spiritual to recreation to having a Starbucks.” He then adds, “But we’re recognizing that there’s a much stronger need for us to be out in the community. For years, our church had plans to build a recreation and fitness center. Those plans were cancelled, because it’s better for us to be out at the Bally’s and YMCA making an impact.”

In spite of First Baptist Church of Orlando’s plans, megachurches by and large want to offer the best of everything, from design to technology to recreation. And they employ mega-contractors to achieve it. Idlewild Baptist Church in Tampa recently completed its new 440,000-square-foot auditorium and campus; it’s almost as big as the nearby International Mall. For the job, the church enlisted KHS&S Contractors; among the firm’s others projects: the main terminal renovation at Tampa International Airport, the 440,000-square-foot Pier 1 Imports corporate headquarters in Fort Worth, and the Borgata Hotel and Casino in Atlantic City. Among Idlewild’s many amenities are the huge high-definition televisions, fabricated by the same firm than creates screens for IMAX. In Clearwater, the Church of Scientology is currently constructing the Flag Building, known to the church’s inner circle as the “Super Power” building. Once completed, it will encompass 380,000 square feet — 889 rooms across six floors. The structure, to be the biggest in Pinellas County, was designed by Tampa architecture firm Hellmuth, Obata and Kassabaum. Its portfolio includes the Anaheim Convention Center, and Telstra Stadium, the $690 million complex in Sydney, Australia, built for the 2000 Summer Olympics. Some megachurches make a high-concept exterior design their calling card. City Harvest Church in Singapore, built for $48 million, is a swirling hemicycle reminiscent of the Guggenheim Museum in New York City. City Harvest also boasts a 40-foot, 1,800-pound stainless steel cross, the biggest of its kind in the world.

Others offer smaller perks. Calvary Assembly in Winter Park has a coffeehouse café in the lobby. Calvary Chapel in Palm Bay has an indoor skate park. Twitchell reports that at one megachurch he visited, numbers are assigned to children at the youth center and daycare. “During the services I saw that there was often a subscript ticker on the supersized screen announcing that ‘The parents of child #267 need to come to the Sunday School’ just like a news crawl on CNN or the market report on CNBC.”

“We were the first church to be all high-definition: equipment, cameras, televisions, all in HD,” says Dr. Brunson. “I use videoclips in my sermons, and sometimes put outlines up on the screen.” Is your church ever criticized for being too contemporary? “We’re probably the most traditional Baptist church there is. Technology isn’t what makes a church contemporary. Technology is just a good way to help get the message out. It’s the message that makes you traditional or contemporary.”

Part III: Branding and Business

Part of Smith’s job as media and communications pastor is “broadening the church communication, checking over our printed publications.” He adds, “I’m in charge of identity and brand managing.”

Identity and brand managing are an interesting choice of words. But religion in a business, and business requires such practices. According to Twitchell, there are more clergy in America than Ford and Chrysler employees. “If religion were a company, it would be number five on the Fortune 500, its $50 billion in revenues putting it behind IBM and just ahead of GE.”

No pastor would call church a business, but it looks just like one. Take for instance Smith’s church. It has an annual budget of $14 million. There are 140 full-time staff, and 215 working part-time. There are 18 pastors. In 2001, it bought the adjacent land for $3 million; it was a former RC Cola bottling plant.

“One of the negative things, as I said before, is that people see the pastors at megachurches as running a major corporation,” says Dr. Brunson. “I see myself only as a shepherd of a congregation. I have to be responsible for our people, but also financially responsible. The Bible says the church should run better than anything in the work world. But I have a real aversion to being called a CEO.”

No matter how you put it, congregants are like consumers: they have a lot of choices, and often need incentive. Dr. Brunson says his church drums up interest via direct mail, printed flyers, and television and radio spots. Among the many things that a megachurch’s youth center does is built brand loyalty. As Twitchell puts it, “The first rule of Marketing 101: Target the audience just on the edge of consumption. Find them before they buy, before they listen to competing brands, and you will get them for life.” 

Part IV: Impact Vs. Overthrow

To measure the influence religion can have on a city, one needs to look no further than Clearwater. It started in 1975 when the historic Fort Harrison Hotel, the place where Keith Richards wrote the riff to “(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction,” was purchased by the ambiguously titled “United Churches of Florida.” It was later discovered that this clandestine organization was in fact the Church of Scientology. According to the St. Petersburg Times, over the past 30 years the church has purchased 21 buildings and about a dozen vacant lots in Clearwater. Their population surged as well. Of the 108,000 residents, 12,000 are Scientologists. They own more than 200 local businesses.

The church’s economic impact on Clearwater is considerable. According to the Church of Scientology’s website, Scientologists spend an estimated $96.7 million annually in direct purchases in the Clearwater area. The website also notes that the city has experienced a dramatic reduction in crime. This may be due to the countless security cameras mounted to Scientology-owned buildings. Expansion is a major tenant of the religion. The previously mentioned Flag Building has been under construction since 1999, when 560 men began a constant, 16-hour pour of 18,000 tons of concrete. It’s directly across the street from the Fort Harrison Hotel; the two will connect via skybridge.

Such a strong presence has left others feeling stifled. Calvary Baptist Church, which had been in downtown Clearwater for more than a century, moved to a new location in 2004. Jim Underwood, a Calvary Baptist deacon, told the St. Petersburg Times, “I am concerned that Clearwater has become synonymous with being a mecca for Scientologists.”

Part V: The Book of Revelations

The megachurch should not come as a surprise. We are mega-consumers. We have consolidated every other dimension of our lives, from communication (phone-email-GPS-mp3 player) to material consumption (Wal-Mart, Target). Smith says, “Twenty years ago, when the megachurch movement began, the World War II generation thought that the church was a sacred place. It’s the house of God. But new progressive Christian thinking is: this is just a building. There’s no mystique; it’s only sacred because it’s where God’s people meet to worship. With that thinking, we can make the church anything we want.”  

In 1925, Bruce Barton, founder of legendary advertising firm BBDO, wrote the book The Man Nobody Knows (a reference to Jesus). Barton writes, “It has been remarked that ‘no astronomer can be an atheist,’ which is another way of saying that no man can look up at the first and greatest electric sign — the evening stars — and refuse to believe its message: ‘There Is A Cause: A God.’” The megachurch will continue to proliferate because we are a nation of believers, and we believe in power in numbers. Look at Black Friday, protest marches, and 30-second Super Bowl advertisements going for $2.5 million. Oftentimes, we believe even more when there’s a cool special effect to sell it. And what greater special effect is there than everlasting life?