SOUTH BARRINGTON, Ill. (RNS) — In the summer of 1992, a reporter made a pilgrimage to the Chicago suburbs to get a firsthand look at Willow Creek Community Church, a congregation rumored to be the future of American religion.
What he found was worshippers swaying to a rock band, a humorous skit with a spiritual message, a sermon about how God could make their lives better — a service that bore more than a passing resemblance to an episode of “Saturday Night Live,” which debuted the night before Willow Creek opened in the fall of 1975.
The story in the Chicago Reader by Robert McClory, himself a former priest, ran under the headline “We have seen the future of religion. And it is slick” — and asked, “Is this religion for the 21st century, or just the latest in religious gimmickry? Perhaps it’s a little bit of both.”
In fact, nearly everything McClory saw would be completely unremarkable to many churchgoers today. Willow Creek, which turns 50 this week, became a new model of American religion, which replaced tall steepled churches, stained glass, hymns and robed clergy with pastors in jeans backed by chart-topping bands, video screens and smoke machines, a worship style that has been summed up as a Coldplay concert followed by a TED Talk.
At its peak, Willow Creek’s model dre …