Prologue

As I've started this blog, my wife and I have had several conversations about what we want to come of it. My main fear is that by working on this narrative, I will keep her wound open. There are few things more dangerous than this. While one of my goals for writing this is to provide her closure, I need to make sure that I am not doing the opposite by uncovering new information and generating new concerns. That seems like a ways off for now. Prior to any real investigation, I want to begin the story with her own experience. This post will focus on that, only through my perspective.

In 1993 my wife, at the age of 2, moved with her parents to the Nashville area. Her dad worked with a drug prevention program called "Just Say No" that was created by Nancy Reagan. He traveled regularly for work speaking to schools across the country. They wanted to live somewhere that was close to an airport with a low cost of living. He would tell stories of people abusing drugs while promoting an understanding of peer pressure. Critics argued that the program did not have any clear evidence of preventing drug use among teens and young adults. The program would be shut down by Bill Clinton's administration in the following years.

Her family moved into a neighborhood in the suburb of Bellevue. Two doors down from them was a local pastor named David Foster. I am able to disclose his name because he is now deceased, much to the dismay of some very good people. He helped her family move into their house. The family was very kind and welcoming. Her parents were Christian and had been looking for a new church to attend. Foster encouraged my wife's family to attend the church he had just started that met at a local school. They held services in the gymnasium and for the most part, it was pretty humble. Attendees consisted of local musicians, creatives, and other community members that made up the Nashville suburb at the time. Over a few years the church would grow significantly, and eventually launched a campaign to construct their own building. The name would also change from Bellevue Community Church to Hope Park. If you want a frame of reference on the size of Hope Park, know that it's about to become the new high school in present day.

For context, the 90's were an interesting time for Bellevue. As people started moving to Middle Tennessee for a lower cost of living, this suburb was seen as a prime location. Foster had the capability to ride this wave and did so. People were moving and needed a church, while he had the growing community. This all happened before Bellevue took a nosedive in the 2000's with the rise of a new suburb.

With the new building, many changes came with it. David Foster became less of a pastor and more of a celebrity figure. He moved out of my wife's neighborhood into a bigger house. Remember that Bellevue's economy took a nosedive, so he wanted to live somewhere that gave him more status. Status, it seems, is very important to popular ministers. Foster became less involved with the community members. His interests shifted to writing books and speaking across the country. Instead of being a local pastor, he had a brand that he was selling. One of his books was titled "The Renegade's Guide to God" with a tagline on finding a new life outside of the conventional church. It was clear that David Foster had big things in mind that took precedence to the growing number of supporters and paid no mind to his humble beginnings. Instead of staying around after service to speak with attendees, he would immediately leave the building. Foster may have confused being in the right place at the right time with the idea that he had a gift that made him unique. I never knew him personally, so I cannot say for sure. People that heard his sermons can attest to his motivational speeches. To this day, he still has a following.

Eventually there was a split in 2002. Families who had been there a long time were beginning to see through Foster. He was making decisions that people found questionable. People also were not sure where their money was going. It was clear that Foster was doing well for himself, and he had the ego to show for it. At the same time, he had brought in an assistant pastor significantly younger than him. This assistant pastor saw the corruption and misuse of his leadership. Attendees started approach this assistant pastor and insisted that something needed to be done. He also shared a similar charisma that made Foster so popular to begin with. There was enough of a crowd that this man in his mid-20's saw an opportunity to build his own following. People thought Foster wouldn't notice, because he was too busy speaking on television and doing book tours. Then while he was on vacation, Foster announced that his assistant pastor had quit. What he didn't realize, however, is how many families would go with him.

The church Foster started began to turn against him. By 2006, the elders had seen many people leave and noticed that Foster was only choosing staff members that were subservient to him. He had become more concerned with his own career than the typical goals of a religious organization. They made the hasty decision to fire the pastor in order to save their church. Unfortunately, this would lead the demise of Bellevue Community Church/Hope Park. It wasn't because the attendees defended their pastor, though some did. It was simply too late. People had lost faith in the movement they started. Foster would start a new church, known as The Gathering, that met every Sunday in Franklin, Tennessee at the local movie theater. In 2007-08 I would drive by every morning while I was on my way to work at a sandwich shop. Little did I know, I would be writing about this over ten years later.

There is little to be said about The Gathering. His remaining followers were devoted to him. Although he still felt like a celebrity figure, it was clear that his peak days had ended. His new church would last until his untimely passing in 2012. My wife still attended his funeral, though she hadn't been a member of his church for nearly ten years. Instead, she and her family, along with many other former attendees of BCC/HP were with his former assistant at a much larger church they had started from the ground up.

The church that started as a result of Foster's success story is the true subject of this blog. Whether or not there is a correlation in the story of David Foster and this new church will also be researched in the posts that follow. My next post will look into the mind of a pastor. What caused the shift for Foster? Why did he forget what brought him to such an elevated position? Did he believe it was solely his words people were following? As I go through the narrative of my wife's megachurch experience, I'm hoping to find answers to these questions too.

"The Megachurch"

A megachurch is defined as a Protestant Christian church with an average of 2,000 attendees on a typical weekend. The term was birthed in the south, where church is still very much a way of life. These churches are funded heavily by donations and free of taxation. One example, Lakewood Church, is run by Joel Osteen in Houston, Texas. Osteen’s church averages around 52,000 attendees per week. The venue itself was formerly home to NBA basketball team the Houston Rockets.

In our home state, these churches are everywhere. While many still prefer the smaller chapel environment, it seems like people also tend to end up at these bigger church communities. One family told me that their church even had its own Starbucks. In college I would make extra money by proctoring AP tests for high school students every year in May. The schools had to use local churches in order to house the high number of students. In my own experience, I saw a bible-themed playground that ascended three floors (yes it looked awesome), a daycare center with professional audio/visual equipment, and “main venues” that well-known musicians wouldn’t be able to fill on their own. On Sundays in high school, the local movie theater was rented by another pastor. The crazy thing is, these weren’t even the “big” ones.

So what makes these churches so popular? I find it hard to believe that peer pressure is even a remote factor, though I’m sure that’s the case for many families. These churches can’t function without attendees that donate their hard-earned money, and I don’t think I’ve ever heard of one shutting down. People who attend these megachurches often admit that they don’t feel close to their community, or their god for that matter, when in attendance. Without the community, the only answer that seems to be a common thread is the pastor. As I mentioned before, religion and faith are very emotional for people. Whether we are looking for strength to push through hard times, or simply a sense of belonging, people in need of something “more” tend to find refuge in the church. The pastor is the one who communicates these emotions to their attendees. They essentially serve as a medium communicating his/her god’s word to the people. People don’t go to these churches for the arena experience, they go to see the one on stage. They want to hear him just as badly as the thousands of other people that show up on Sunday.

So what creates the appeal for a megachurch pastor? What makes Joel Osteen seem like a better representation of God than a humbled elderly man in a small chapel? Part of this revolves around our culture. When the idea of church became less appealing in the 80’s and 90’s, the church had to fight to stay relevant. It’s not solely the pastor, though we will get back to that very soon. The megachurch is an experience. It features high tech visuals, sound, etc. It’s no coincidence that these services look like rock concerts, because that’s entirely what they are modeled after. But this isn’t just a place to see a band play your favorite songs; this is a place where you’re given purpose and direction and, in the end, guaranteed an all-inclusive eternal reward when you die. Getting into heaven never looked, sounded, or felt more real. If you are a religious person, but found traditional church somewhat uneventful, this was the answer.

Beyond the revamped churchgoing experience, megachurches operate as their own university. My wife’s church has several “campuses” around the city. They offer a number of different groups and clubs, as well as a newcomer class for those who choose to join. When I browse their website, I see a lot about the church. I see their name everywhere. What I don’t see is anything mentioning Christ or the Bible. This is something I had seen previously mentioned when I looked up online reviews.

Yelp reviews for my wife’s former church all celebrate the head pastor, save for the reviews submitted after October 2017 following his departure. One review from 2014 stated that as soon as you entered the church, you fell in love with this pastor. Another review applauds their cutting edge sound system. One submission mentions driving 74 miles one way just to hear this man speak, while another notes that his sermons were a staple of the church’s success. This is true. A pastor must be charismatic, wise, and appeal to people’s emotions. One look at these Yelp reviews shows that this pastor was more than that. He seems to be a larger-than-life figure. I remember my wife saying in October 2017 that while she was in high school, one of his sermons inspired her to donate all of the $300 she had to her name.

How and why is this? The most sensible answer is that the church needs to do this in order to survive. Religion is not a business, though in many ways a church has to function like one. These organizations have accountants, secretaries, managers, etc. to keep things running. But a strong administrative sector isn’t what keeps people going to a church and donating their money; it’s the pastor.  The pastor is the face of the church. His words are seen by many attendees as that of god, communicating through a man they can see, hear, and feel.

I believe that there are truly good “megachurches” out there. I believe that these churches, like any other religious organization, can do amazing things for millions of people. I believe that even my wife’s church was good at one point. It very well may still be; I only know what I’ve been told. Despite everything I have heard, I’ve failed to figure out what made a man that started one of the most successful churches in the city leave so abruptly? Many saw this coming, and the pastor stated publicly that it was time for a break. Not long afterwards, his wife filed for divorce. My wife was asking questions, but nobody seemed to want to answer. Even her parents insisted that it was best to leave this all alone.

As an outsider, I could not help but wonder what people were hiding. Why weren’t people trying to figure out what was going on behind the scenes? What was it that made everyone afraid to answer my wife’s questions? This did not seem normal to me. When someone people love goes away, there is a need for closure. But this time no one seemed to have closure, nor were they able to offer it.

In my next posts, I'm going to see who I can talk to about what happened, as well as the history of the church itself. This is the first of many posts and the beginning of a long journey.

An Introduction

In May of 2017 my wife and I celebrated our wedding with friends and family. What people didn’t know is that we had actually been married for a few months. Our original wedding took place in early October of 2016. Earlier that year in June we found a good deal on plane tickets for the week of our fall break. As the date approached, we realized there wasn’t much that we wanted to do. We had been engaged for a month and decided that a private ceremony would alleviate the stress of planning a wedding. Although the wedding in May was the wedding, it really feels like our wedding was in October. 

While we were in line to check in at the MGM Grand Hotel, my wife received a notification that the pastor of her old church had resigned. She asked me for some space as she reached out to several individuals to find out what was going on. Her family was upset and so was she. My wife has never been religious in the time I’ve known her, so this definitely caught me off guard. I knew that she grew up a Christian, but just two years prior to us meeting she had left the church for personal reasons.

Even though we still had an unforgettable vacation, the pastor’s departure loomed over us. I couldn’t figure out why my wife was so angry. This pastor had been given the job as president of a Christian media company where he would undoubtedly make good money. My wife’s family had also stopped attending this church years prior. So what was it about this departure that made so many people upset?

Before going any further, it is worth noting that I myself know very little about the church. I was raised in a very-low key Jewish household. Religion was not a centerpiece of my family. We moved to the South in 2001 and I had never seen Christianity represented in such a massive form. We saw churches the size of stadiums. The church you went to was a defining component of one’s identity. For the most part, however, I remained an outsider to it all. I knew that religion meant a lot to people, but the inner-workings of a church were still unbeknownst to me. 

I also assumed that anyone going to church did nothing wrong. I felt alienated from my peers in this sense. Church people seemed, to put it simply, better than me. For that reason, most of my friends were non-religious or at the very least non-Christian. My best friend went to church in middle school, but after his confirmation never went back. Needless to say, I didn’t have any real knowledge of the culture. At a wedding in 2016, I saw my first communion. On Christmas Eve 2017, I went to my first ever church service.

Since the start of 2018 my wife and I have been going to therapy sessions in order to become stronger. One of the main things we’ve had to do is come face to face with our past trauma. Because we are still at the stage of recognition, it feels as if these wounds have suddenly become reopened. My issues have been mostly internal and relatively easy to deal with. My wife’s trauma, however, stems way deeper into a giant community that shares the same wound. It also revolves around a level of corruption that may still exist to this day. I’m hoping that by exploring this I can bring a level of closure to my wife while also striving to better understand what it is that she and so many others went through.

While I do not know much about Christianity, I do know that religion is a very sensitive subject to many people. Faith is, in many ways, stronger than logic. It is also emotional. For this reason I am going to refrain from any direct accusations. The people I speak to will remain anonymous, and the information I share will only be with the appropriate consent. I do not wish to find anything conclusive nor definitive on the pastor or his church. Instead, I want to tell the story of a church through the words of those who made it into what it is today, as well as the lasting impact it had on so many people.