Pathway Community Church and the megachurch era

Prayer group 2001 — public launch 2002

The founding: Pathway Community Church, the largest congregation of the suburban era, began when four families started praying together in 2001 about planting a church. It launched publicly in early 2002 in a high school gymnasium, moved into its own facility in mid-2007, and grew into a congregation drawing thousands each weekend to 1010 Carroll Road, on the northwest side — a member church of the Missionary Church, the Fort Wayne–headquartered denomination in the entry below. A national megachurch directory of the 2000s already listed the city's three largest congregations: Pathway at about 3,000 in weekly attendance, Blackhawk Baptist at 2,000 and First Assembly of God, on Crescent Avenue, at about 1,800. (Directory claims of a 1999 founding for Pathway circulate; the church's own history gives 2001–02, and its dates are the ones carried here.) The era's storefront churches — the small independent congregations in former retail space on the southeast and south sides — number in the dozens in any current directory but keep no published histories; they are counted, not chronicled, in the "City of Churches" entry below.

Sources:

1. Pathway Community Church, "Our Story" (pccfw.org) — the 2001 prayer group, the 2002 launch, the 2007 facility, Pastor Ron Williams among the founders, the Missionary Church affiliation.
2. National megachurch directory listing (2000s, via nonprofit conference records) — the Pathway, Blackhawk and First Assembly attendance figures, as attributed in the text.