This dissertation will examine the origins, development, and proliferation of corporate marketing and promotion values and practices in American Protestant churches in the latter half of the twentieth century, and it will consider the theological and ecclesiological debates and consequences that accompanied these reconfigurations.

The restructuring of Christianity to meet the challenges of an ever-changing marketplace of ideas and services is by no means a recent phenomenon. However, the shift in American society, throughout the twentieth century, from a culture of production to one of consumption catalyzed an unprecedented commercialization and modernization of Christian churches. Increasingly, churches intentionally adopted corporate strategies and values, while unintentionally shifting authority in doctrine and services to the consumers. These changes raised questions of institutional identity as churches produced, packaged, and delivered religion as a market good, while denying that they were “selling” religion. To make sense of it all, religious leaders developed a robust theology to support the use of market methods, while others formed a strong oppositional theological movement. Local churches were the primary source of these developments, as they were and are the primary institutional force in the teaching, practicing, and refashioning of religious traditions. Scholars have missed the many dynamics of these shifts because they have not focused on the theological questions, the changes in this latter period, and the centrality of local churches.

This dissertation will serve to help fill this gap in the scholarship and will provide pastors the means to consider carefully how Christian institutions might effectively proclaim the Christian message in the modern marketplace of ideas and services while remaining faithful to transcendent divine realities.