ABSTRACT
This chapter analyzes how, despite the sharp decline in Protestant Christian church attendance in the past two decades, megachurches are growing and thriving. Premised on anthropological-sociological research exploring the reality-constructing power of language, this qualitative research employs discourse analysis methodology to conduct a content analysis of the websites of three megachurches in the United States. Employing Fishman's concept of co-sanctified lexicons, it identifies the distinctly different worldviews embedded in each of their lexicons. Lakewood Church in Texas builds on the rugged individualism of the American Dream, offering a worldview in which God serves you, as evidenced by your success in the world. West Angeles Church of God in Christ, an African American church in California, offers a worldview deeply rooted in their slave history, civic and religious emancipation, and religiously emotive and euphoric “hush arbors” of the Deep South. Mars Hill Bible church in Michigan offers a worldview that characterizes the individual as a pilgrim on a journey, writing a story together with the community, in which the nature of truth is narrative rather than factual. This chapter concludes by offering a new theme to existing research on megachurches, that of low commitment–high security belonging.
