Lakewood is the largest mega-church in the U.S. with seating for 16,000. It's housed in the former Compaq Center where the Houston Rockets used to play basketball. Pastor Joel Osteen is the impresario behind Lakewood's success. Osteen insists on high production values, designer lighting and rigorous attention to detail while editing the program for television. We were told on the tour that Lakewood's lighting was intended to mimic Hollywood award shows and cost $1.5 million.
For some crazy reason they offered to let us watch the 7pm service from the catwalk. It was like a Janet Jackson concert meets a Tony Robbins self help seminar, with Barbie and Ken as your hosts. There were fake waterfalls, piped in fog, and it smelled really good for a place full of people. It didn't feel the least bit like my childhood experiences of church at Our Holy Redeemer, but rather like life inside a Christian Biosphere 2.
Pictured is Joel Osteen's wife Victoria, who my husband says looks like a Playboy model.
2 comments:
oooooh... i've so often wanted to see that insanity! i thought about going but was too scared that my obvious lack of faith would make me a walking target for proselytization.
I have also wanted to go lookie loo. But I'm such traffic hater. I couldn't go somewhere where all those people were leaving at the same time.
Kate
Post a Comment