It's a drizzly gray Sunday morning in April 2023, and Antonia and I are going to church.

We cross an expansive parking lot and approach a massive white and brown brick building.

At more than 200,000 square feet,

Gateway Church's main campus in South Lake

is bigger than a typical Walmart super center.

A church volunteer smiles and opens a glass door for us.

Years ago, back before their estrangement, this is where Sharla used to bring Wren to church.

It's also where Weston Brown used to work, before he was outed as gay and fired.

We've come this morning because school board elections are getting underway in this part of North Texas, including in Grapevine.

And we've got a hunch, based on what's happened in the past couple of years, that Gateway's senior pastor is going to take time to talk about it from the pulpit this morning.

Mike and I find a seat near the back of the darkened auditorium as members of the congregation raise their hands in worship.

I attended big churches a lot like this one when I was a teenager and in college.

If you've never been, you might be fooled at first glance into thinking you're attending a rock concert.

The music set is highly produced, with a lead singer strumming a guitar alongside four backup vocalists,

a bass player, someone on keyboards,

and the hippest-looking guy in the room behind them on drums.

A fog machine cloaks the musicians in a smoky mist

as dozens of bright white stage lights whirl around them,

creating a truly transcendent atmosphere.

All of it recorded with high-end television cameras

and projected onto massive video screens above the stage.

Today, most church-going Americans attend large congregations, many of them a lot like this one.

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