We’ve heard stories, for years, about big-box retailers like Wal-Mart coming into town and pushing out the sweet, smalltown, mom-and-pop businesses that had been operating there for years. We can think of hardware stores, markets and book shops that have been shuttered because they couldn’t compete with a corporate behemoth. But what about churches? There’s a growing body of research on the phenomenon known as the “megachurch” — large churches, usually evangelical in nature, with over 2,000 weekly attendants and, sometimes, amusement-park-like amenities: shops, athletic facilities, even water parks, in some cases. Such churches have been on the rise in recent years. Their numbers almost doubled between 1990 and 2000, and they seem to be driving a concentration of Christian adherents into bigger and bigger congregations/Joel Smith, Inlander. More here. (Inlander illustration: Jeff Drew)

Question: Any Real Life attendees out there? Want to compare your megachurch experience to previous experience(s) at smaller churches?