“Infrastructures for Souls”
via [ Triplecanopy ] by Joseph Clarke
Tracing the parallel histories of the American megachurch and the corporate-organizational complex.
THE 1980S AND ’90S SAW THE RISE of so-called seeker megachurches, which targeted those disillusioned with religion. Rather than enforcing traditional worship styles, they embraced counterculture and youth rebellion. Chief among them is Rick Warren’s Saddleback Church, in Orange County, California. Built in the ’90s, Saddleback plays down crosses and other conventional Christian signifiers and avoids mention of its Southern Baptist denominational affiliation. Instead of a massive auditorium, the church occupies multiple midsize structures scattered across a lush 120-acre campus. Visitors customize their worship experience by choosing from a range of services: “Saddleback Classic” in the main Worship Center, “OverDrive” for youth, and “Praise!” for gospel-music lovers.
As Warren’s model gained traction, the ideology of the democratic office was taken to new levels by management theorists associated with the Quality of Work Life movement. They recommended radically open office environments that would give workers control over their environment and dissimulate corporate hierarchy. “Office facility planning should be a systematic process that encourages employee participation, promotes innovation, and champions mobility,” advised a 1985 article in National Productivity Review…
It’s no coincidence that Saddleback mirrors the top office environments of its day. Warren was a good friend of Drucker’s (the consultant died in 2005), and the books he has written for pastors quote Drucker liberally. Drucker, in turn, was so impressed with the business acumen of evangelical leaders that in 1998 he declared the megachurch “surely the most important social phenomenon in American society in the last 30 years.”
