Hipster Mega-Church in Manhattan

Think church is boring? Irrelevant? Check out Carl Lentz’s Hillsong Pentecostal Church in Manhattan or Nadia Bolz-Weber’s All Saint’s Church in Denver, Colorado.  There’s nothing boring or traditional about these pastors or their churches.

According to the short CNN documentary above, over 6,000 people attend Carl Lentz’s Hillsong church on an average Sunday. That’s largely because of  Lentz’s charisma.

He  is a basketball fanatic who many describe as “magnetic.”  His services are filled with nontraditional music and he baptizes newcomers in the nearby hotel swimming pool.

He seems to have the same sort of irreverence for tradition as the Reverend  Nadia Bolz Weber, the tattooed pastor of the All Saints Church in Denver. Just like Weber, Lentz is changing what church looks like. And both are appealing to large audiences.

Some say that Weber is one of five women in religion to watch and some compare Lentz to Joel Osteen.