When will the mega-churches start closing down because of foreclosures?

[ThomWV]

It doesn't seem at all possible that the football-field sized churches won't be effected when their credit draped congregations start falling apart in the current mortgage and credit crisis. I recall reading that church attendance is way down, just at about the same rate at which people are abandoning the Republican Party (imagine that) so I'd have to presume that contributions are sagging as well. Somebody has to pay the mortgage on those monuments to ignorance and their multi-acre parking lots. The sooner they are turned into Dollar Stores the better as far as I'm concerned. Anybody seen any of them in financial trouble in their region?

[Lars39]

1. Maybe they're using their faith-based money to keep up.

[Virginia Dare]

2. Interesting question. lots of churches take out mortgages..

and it seems like they've been building them left and right. I haven't heard of anything like that around here yet though.

[glowing]

3. Well, when the jobs are gone that let you rest on Sunday.. most people

cannot attend.. they usually work their second job or their crappy, smile, please shit on me job on the weekend... mega-church better change with the times, and open on other days than Sunday.

[skepticscott]

4. Banks would rather do anything

than foreclose on a church. It's horrible PR, and from a practical standpoint, not too great either, since it's much harder to re-sell than a house.

[theredpen]

5. A lot of mega-churches feed on the unfortunate

A lot of them preach a something-for-nothing "gospel" that attracts people who can't control their own lives.

Here in Dallas, the "Fellowship Church" mega-church launched an "ineed2change" web-based campaign to lure unhappy people into their church. Go to http://www.ineed2change.com and see how deep you have to click before you see any indication that this is faith-based. Fellowship Church Inc. knows that they'll get a bunch of desperate people to pack their auditoriums and they'll collect a bunch of money that would be better spent on something else and then the people will go back to their crappy lives in 2-3 months. That's how mega-churches operate.

Oh, they brag about having 10,000 at a service. They brag that they had only 8,000 a year previously. What they won't tell you is that only 2,000 of those 8,000 from last year are among the 10,000 this year.

[Lex]

6. They have lots and lots of tax-free cash with which to buy real estate.

nt