Megachurch facts for kids
A megachurch is a church with a very large membership that also offers a variety of educational and social activities. Most megachurches are Protestant, and particularly Evangelical, although the word denotes a type of organization, not a denomination. The Hartford Institute for Religion Research defines a megachurch as any Protestant Christian church that draws 2,000 or more people in a weekend.
The first megachurch was established in London, England, in 1861. More emerged in the 20th century, especially in the United States, and expanded rapidly through the 1980s and 1990s. In the 21st century, megachurches became widespread in the United States and a growing phenomenon in several African countries and Australia. In the late 2000s and early 2010s, they shifted away from traditional church architecture, with most newer ones having stadium-type seating.
History
The origins of the megachurch movement, with many local congregants who return on a weekly basis, can be traced to the 19th century. There were large churches earlier, but they were considerably rarer.
The first evangelical megachurch was founded in 1861 in London by Charles Spurgeon at the Metropolitan Tabernacle, which had a 6,000-seat auditorium.
The first megachurch in the United States was the Angelus Temple, founded in 1923 by Aimee Semple McPherson in a 5,300-seat auditorium in Los Angeles.
Features
A megachurch has been defined by Hartford Institute for Religion Research (2006) and others as any Protestant Christian church which at least 2,000 attend in a weekend. The OED suggests that megachurches often include educational and social activities and are usually Protestant and Evangelical. These large congregations are a significant development in Protestant Christianity.
Most of these churches build their building in the suburbs of large cities, near major roads and highways, to be visible to as many people as possible and easily accessible by car. Some install a large cross to edify believers and evangelize potential new members.
A 2020 study by the Hartford Institute found that 70 percent of American megachurches had a multi-site network and an average of 7.6 services per weekend. The study also found that most U.S. megachurches are in Florida, Texas, California, and Georgia.
Churches that gather more than 10,000 people every Sunday have been dubbed gigachurches. In 2015, there were about 100 gigachurches in the United States.
Several megachurch pastors also preach on television or radio programs, thereby also being televangelists. Aimee Semple McPherson was a pioneer of radio evangelism and a founder of an early megachurch. Robert Schuller, Oral Roberts, Jerry Falwell, Joel Osteen, and T. D. Jakes developed both megachurch and television audiences.
By region
Africa
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Megachurches are found in many countries of Sub-Saharan Africa, including Tanzania, Nigeria, South Africa, Ghana, Kenya, and Uganda. The largest church auditorium, The Glory Dome, was inaugurated in 2018 with 100,000 seats, in Abuja, Nigeria.
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United States
In 2010, the Hartford Institute's database listed more than 1,300 megachurches in the United States. About 50 churches on the list had average attendance exceeding 10,000, and one had 47,000. On one weekend in November 2015, around one in ten Protestant churchgoers in the U.S.—about 5 million people—attended service in a megachurch. Some 3,000 individual Catholic Church parishes have 2,000 or more attendants for an average Sunday Mass, but they are not called megachurches as that is a Protestant term.
In the United States, the phenomenon has more than quadrupled in the two decades to 2017.
Asia
In 2007, five of the ten largest Protestant churches were in South Korea. In 2007, the largest megachurch in the world by attendance was South Korea's Yoido Full Gospel Church, an Assemblies of God (Pentecostal) church, with more than 830,000 members.
Australia
Australian scholar Sam Hey wrote in 2011 that "almost all megachurch developments are Pentecostal, or charismatic and neo-Pentecostal offshoots".
One of the first megachurches in Australia was the Christian Outreach Centre (COC), now the International Network of Churches.
Hillsong Church was founded in 1983 in Sydney, New South Wales, out of two Christian Life Centre churches and has since planted churches all around Australia and the world. Another significant Australian international Pentecostal network is the C3 Global Network, founded in 1980.
See also
In Spanish: Megaiglesia para niños
- List of the largest evangelical churches
- List of the largest evangelical church auditoriums
- List of megachurches in the United States
- Pentecostalism in Australia
