As the holiday season approaches, people across the U.S. will be looking for a place to celebrate Christmas, and may attend services at one of the 20 churches in America that have 18,000 or more congregants.
The largest congregation, or “megachurch,” in the U.S. belongs to Life Church based in Edmond Oklahoma, which has an average attendance of 85,000.
Out of the 20 largest congregations in the U.S., three of them are in Texas and six are in California.
Scott Thumma, director of the Hartford Institute for Religion Research, told Newsweek: “CA and TX have the largest percent of US population and the most religious adherents…Also the southern half of the country has a larger percentage of persons who are religious practitioners.
“The sunbelt states also have been most likely to gain population from migration from other parts of the country and have larger suburban sprawl where megachurches flourish for many reasons.”
Thumma explained: “Nearly all these churches over 15,000 are what we call multisite congregations. This means that 15,000 people do not all worship in the same place at the same time like for a professional football game.
“There are exceptions like Joel Osteen’s Lakewood Church but that is a unique situation in this era of multisite megachurches.
“The typical multisite megachurch would have 5-7 or more, like Life Church of OK with 45 campuses, locations. Many of these might have seating for 500-1000 or less, thus feeling like a much smaller church than the imagined mega gathering of thousands.
David J. Phillip/Associated Press
Professor Jim Wellman, author of ‘High on God,’ said: “The appeal [of a mega churches] is a community that is large, engaged and usually on the younger side.
“These churches are like small towns, they are big enough to care for many people, and this care extents building strong families, creating churches that community organizations that appeal every age group with fun and engaging opportunities, including educational opportunities and also an enormous engagement with the needs of their communities, including helping those with less, shelters,…
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