(ANALYSIS) If someone asks me who the most famous preacher in the United States is, the answer is honestly quite simple. It’s Joel Osteen, by a mile. He leads Lakewood Church in Houston, Texas. His congregation meets in what used to be the home of the Houston Rockets basketball team. Its seating capacity is nearly 17,000. Osteen’s first book “Your Best Life Now” sold a reported eight million copies.

But, what really propels Osteen into a different level of fame is his presence on television. According to data from 2007, the church spent about $30 million to buy thirty minute blocks of TV time in hundreds of media markets across the United States.

The end result of this expense is that, according to their own records, about seven million people watch Osteen’s sermon each week. He has 10 million followers on Twitter.

However, one criticism that other Christian leaders tend to levy against Osteen is that he preaches a form of the prosperity gospel. He has intimated that true followers of Jesus Christ will find a prosperous life full of health, healing, and financial gains while on Earth. He said last month that he was “not a poverty minister.”

This piece by Tara Isabella Burton does a nice job of explaining the contours of prosperity theology and some of its most high profile proponents (Osteen included). But, one has to wonder — how pervasive is this understanding of the Gospel among average Americans?

Back in 2012, the General Social Survey included a special module of questions that is housed by the Association of Religion Data Archives that specifically focused on issues related to views of the Bible and theology. There are two questions that tap into some of the basic tenets of prosperity theology.

To read the rest of Ryan Burge’s post, click here.

Ryan Burge is an assistant professor of political science at Eastern Illinois University, a pastor in the American Baptist Church and the co-founder and frequent contributor to Religion in Public, a forum for scholars of religion and politics to make their work accessible to a more general audience. His research focuses on the intersection of religiosity and political behavior, especially in the U.S. Follow him on X at @ryanburge.