Church: The ultimate social club.
The social club comment is about right for some places.
A megachurch extension opened close to me. A mega-church in its own right. But one of many off-shoots from its original megachurch. I enjoyed their radio program previously and looked forward to them coming. Then I read about how they have a coffee shop in the hall with high priced drinks like starbucks. No simple coffee and chit-chat there. And the more I read, how everything was ‘priced’ from counseling with the minister and certain gatherings, etc. the less excited I was. Needless to say, it did seem more like a club than a church.