This charismatic authority I portray as a dramatic production, what I call a “dramatic web” that draws followers into its scene and script, offering some resolution to their worries. People attribute exemplary powers to someone who offers them a way out, and intellectually and emotionally bond with the visionary and their vision. While the concept of “charisma” is often used equivocally, in the tradition of Max Weber I contend that charismatic authority is best understood not only as an extraordinary individual quality but as a form of cultural authority that arises when traditional and institutional forms have lost their plausibility and people experience uncertainty, dissatisfaction, or distress.
It argues that charismatic leadership, not calculated management and branding techniques, best explains the rapid growth of this megachurch as well as the deep commitments many people make to it. This dissertation challenges the Elmer Gantry stereotype and the religious economic perspectives by examining one particular megachurch pastor named Bruxy Cavey in the context of his “irreligious” megachurch community called The Meeting House. Similarly, writers assume megachurch attendees are a passive audience, or even dupes. Why are these leaders and their large congregations so popular in an age of increasing “religious nones”? Commentators in both popular and academic literature often resort to characterizing the leadership with stereotypes of manipulative opportunists along the lines of Sinclair Lewis’ Elmer Gantry (1927) or narrow characterizations of savvy entrepreneurs who thrive in a competitive religious economy. Megachurch pastors-as local and international celebrities-have been a growing phenomenon since the 1960s, when megachurches began to proliferate across North America. There is much new and different material. NOTE: this PhD was re-worked, with deleted chapters and new chapters in my book _The Subversive Evangelical_.
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