Megachurches

Hate them. My grandson and that side of the family are heavily involved in one in the next city. I have been a couple of times and the atmosphere is like a nightclub, loud guitars and ‘singing’, with flashing lights. Seems based around the personalities of the leaders and it all makes me very uncomfortable. I hope it’s kosher 😁 My GS has been a member for a long time and hasn’t changed, he’s still lovely, but I don’t trust them.

I hardly trust my own RC church, but give me quietness any time. I love to go in at random times and just sit and meditate.

biglouis

Any kind of organized religion makes me run a mile. I can see the attraction of small quiet country churches but these huge places seem so comercialised.

As an atheist, I concur.

However, I have spent many, many hours in "small quiet country churches" - those that are still open all hours allowing people to just quietly sit and meditate. If the church has a burial ground, it's interesting to walk around and look at the headstones and think about all those departed souls who used to live locally.

They are an oasis of calm. When I lived with my mother for a while in rural Lincolnshire, I worked with the volunteers to keep the village church clean and polished, and filled with fresh flowers when occasion demanded it. It had a huge kitchen attached, at Christmas everyone attended the 11pm service and then congregated in the kitchen for mulled wine and mince-pies before walking home (most did walk rather than drive) with torches and lanterns because there was no lighting along the country lanes.

Very Thomas Hardy! A way of life, very English, and something that must be preserved as part of our culture (IMO), atheist or not. I have no idea why it matters to me, but it does!

Sinister but I find all organised religion sinister.

Personally I find them off putting, Too commercial and on the whole don’t trust the true motives of those running them. I like a church to be welcoming and quiet except for the hymns.

Good to hear nanna8

I have not been to Hillsong.
I have been to a church that has about 800 people per service, 3 services on a Sunday.
Had a lot of students attending. But not sure that is called a megachurch.

Like all churches, larger ones need to be careful they keep God at the centre of them. Not the music in itself, nor the social aspect only.

I went to one once when one of my daughters got baptised. It was actually a baptist church, not pentecostal but I really found it hard to cope with. She has since left that church and goes to a quiet Presbyterian one with a much smaller congregation. Churches as a whole are alive and well here, whatever the brand. A few disappeared in the 1980 s but there is a bit of a revival now. There are at least 6 within a couple of kms from us, all thriving and surviving. Perhaps because of the number of migrants from all over the world?

Any kind of organized religion makes me run a mile. I can see the attraction of small quiet country churches but these huge places seem so comercialised.

It may have to do with the community, how they bond and activities they do together (beyond masses and other religious ceremonies)

You are probably right, fancythat, though even traditional churches often have a monthly family service which attracts a few, or more, younger people, or perhaps do a midweek event called “ messy church”. But most have dropped out once their children are over the age of 9 or 10.
Many of my friends are church goers, but almost all our children have stopped going, once sport, park run, family days out, visits to grandparents etc takes up their time on Sundays.
I too fail to understand the attraction of the style of these mega churches, but numerically they do seem to be successful.

I agree.
Glad different ages attend.

I would say that around here, for a 30 mile radius, I have not heard of a church that is not evangelical, that has a significant number of under 40s attending.

I wouldnt mind guessing it is more like 50 miles.

I live rurally.

Our parish church has a service every other Sunday. It’s very close to me and always open during daylight hours.

It’s not only people of my generation who attend. Going to church is something of a country tradition.

How often does anyone go?

It strikes me that GN does have several people who go.

But the old quiet church style does not seem to suit many under the age of 40. Or even 50.

But how often do you actually go to the quiet church?

I think there are definite both pros and cons to a megachurch.

I’d never heard of them before. Certainly not to my taste. I don’t go for the happy clappy style. Give me the peace and quiet of an old church and the BCP any day.

I would run a mile from any church that employed any version of "god favours us, hence our success" as a recruitment spiel. That was NOT the message of the original founder of Christianity.

the same psychological techniques that are used in marketing and sales are employed to great success.
we live in such a consumerist society in the richer part of the world that we are pre-programmed to respond to these approaches.
they peddle it as a wise investment, give something to get something.
just like a commercial transaction.
this church is bigger and better, washes whiter.
god favours us, hence our success.
you join to our success; and give generously.
that's my take on it.

Christianity Today is a reputable source as far as I know.

www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2022/may-web-only/hillsong-church-music-sing-worship-scandal-documentary.html

Witzend

I didn’t know you had them in Oz - I thought they were an American thing.
Not that I’m a churchgoer, but if I were I think I’d find them weird and off-putting, too.

Hillsong was founded in Australia and has churches in many other countries.

I don't know a lot about them but am always rather suspicious of these modern evangelistic movements.

I didn’t know you had them in Oz - I thought they were an American thing.
Not that I’m a churchgoer, but if I were I think I’d find them weird and off-putting, too.