Movie-theater church loses Union Station spot

It began with an unusual proposition -- holding church at Union Station's movie theater -- but after 13 years of meeting, praising and preaching every Sunday at the multiplex, National Community Church has lost its home.

The train station's Phoenix Theatres were closed Oct. 12, and with them went the church's innovative sanctuary, which over the years has sparked dozens of similar movie theater-based churches across the country.

The Rev. Mark Batterson said he had heard rumors that the cineplex might close but was shocked this month when he was given six days' notice. The church, however, will survive, he said.

"A church is not a building; it's not the location where we meet," Batterson said. "A church is made up of its people."

Last Sunday was the church's first without the facility, and people flocked instead to Ebenezer's Coffeehouse, which is owned and operated by the church. Batterson led three services for packed houses there.

National Community Church has faced similar challenges. When Batterson took the helm in 1996, the church consisted of 19 people renting space in a Southeast Washington school. Within nine months, the group lost its first sanctuary when the government closed the school for code violations.

Intent on staying on Capitol Hill, the church moved into the Union Station movie theater. Although that was an unorthodox move at the time, the theater proved to be a perfect location for a church, its leaders said. It took little time each Sunday to convert the theater into a sanctuary. The space was affordable and came with ample and comfortable seating and a multimedia stage and screen.
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The church served about 700 people at Union Station and has locations at movie theaters in Georgetown, Kingstowne and Arlington County, with about 2,000 congregants total.

The church's growth has corresponded with a movie theater church movement nationwide. In the past decade, such locations have become an increasingly popular option.

The Leadership Network, a church consulting firm, estimated in a 2006 study that there are 300 churches based in movie theaters. A few years ago, National CineMedia, a Colorado-based advertising business, launched an entire division to work with 180 such churches at AMC, Regal and Cinemark theaters across the country.

Barry Brown, the division director, said that number continues to increase. "What's happening at Union Station is an isolated incident. The larger network of churches is still growing," he said. National Community and its pastor are considered leaders of that trend.

Now that its Union Station sanctuary is gone, the church has started looking for a similar space.

"When we were just starting out and we lost the school we were in, we trusted God to open doors for us," Batterson said. "What he provided was so much better than we could have imagined. Now we're just trusting God in the same way. He'll provide."