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Michael Adkison\/Houston Public Media<\/p>\n
A congregant watches cowboy church at the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo on March 15, 2026.<\/p>\n
There are two kinds of people who go to a cowboy church, chaplain Danny Biddy says: those who are cowboys and those who wish they were.<\/p>\n
“A lot of people wear hats to the service and take them off when they pray,” he said. “They tip their hat to ladies, you know. There\u2019s a lot of that Western culture. I mean, nobody comes in wearing six shooters on their hips.”<\/p>\n
As for hats, there were plenty to be seen at a service last Sunday at the NRG Center. Of the 100-plus people who attended the 10 a.m. service, more than 50 wore cowboy hats, including the four kids in a family band leading worship \u2014 not to mention several people passing through to find out where the country hymns were coming from at the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo.<\/p>\n
Sign up for the Hello, Houston!<\/a> daily newsletter to get local reports like this delivered directly to your inbox.<\/p>\n For many years, a congregation of cowboy churchgoers has met at the Houston rodeo, preaching to competitors, devoted congregants, festival attendees and curious passersby. Their final gathering this year is Sunday, March 22, with a guest sermon from former Houston Oilers defensive tackle Ray Childress.<\/p>\n Religion is never too far from mind at the Houston rodeo. Each show inside NRG Stadium includes a convocation, as do many of the celebrations throughout the three-week festival. Still, Biddy said many of the competitors on the rodeo circuit are on the road frequently and may not have a church they call home. Part of his goal, he said, is catering to those believers.<\/p>\n Click here for more inDepth features.<\/a> Michael Adkison\/Houston Public Media<\/p>\n Danny Biddy, right, speaks with congregants after a cowboy church service at the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo on March 15, 2026.<\/p>\n “You can see in the arena itself,” Biddy, who said he’s led the services since 2018, told Houston Public Media in an interview. “These young men and young ladies, they feel like this is what their sport is, what they\u2019re supposed to do in life. Just like football players, basketball, baseball, they feel like rodeo is what they\u2019re supposed to do with their lives at this point in time. And so, they say it\u2019s something about the old cowboy heritage, that God was something that everybody understood.”<\/p>\n “Christ Centered, Biblically Based, Cowboy Identified”<\/p>\n Besides appealing to a Western way of living, cowboy churches are hard to define. Congregations differ from one another, and there’s no clear moment when cowboy churches began to distinguish themselves.<\/p>\n “The cowboy church is based around an idea that a lot of these cowboy culture people have been left behind by mainstream Christianity,” said Marie Dallam, a religious studies professor at the University of Oklahoma. “And it’s seeking to make a church that culturally embraces them and is comfortable for them so that they can still participate in church outreach.”<\/p>\n Dallam, who authored “Cowboy Christians<\/a>” in 2018, said some of the reasons cowboy churchgoers may feel that way include their informality, levels of education or “living a lifestyle that a lot of mainstream churches might regard as sinful in some way.”<\/p>\n The services at the Houston rodeo are under the umbrella of the Fellowship of Christian Cowboys, a nonprofit focused on church ministry at rodeos. A pamphlet at the service identifies their organization as “Christ Centered, Biblically Based, Cowboy Identified.”<\/p>\n Michael Adkison\/Houston Public Media<\/p>\n A copy of \u201cThe Way for Cowboys,\u201d a pocket-sized New Testament with cowboy-focused devotionals, on top of a pamphlet for the Fellowship of Christian Cowboys.<\/p>\n Next to the pamphlet were free copies of “The Way for Cowboys,” a pocket-sized copy of the New Testament made, in part, by the fellowship with cowboy- and rodeo-themed devotionals sprinkled throughout.<\/p>\n “Rodeo clowns make the decision to step between the cowboy and the bull,” one entry reads. “Jesus Christ did the same for us by stepping between our sin and the judgment of God.”<\/p>\n The fellowship was founded in 1974, according to the organization, by Wilbur Plaugher, a rodeo clown who’s in the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum hall of fame<\/a>, and Mark Schricker, a National Finals Rodeo calf roping and steer wrestling champion. Today, the Fellowship of Christian Cowboys is based in Ca\u00f1on City, Colorado. Bob Devine, the chair of the nonprofit’s board of directors, carried the rodeo flag<\/a> during the Houston rodeo’s grand entry on Tuesday.<\/p>\n The fellowship isn’t the only cowboy church organization \u2014 another is the American Fellowship of Cowboy Churches \u2014 though not all such churches are affiliated. There’s no “cowboy church” denomination and their beliefs largely align with most evangelical churches; as a result, many of them operate independently, or in affiliation with other denominations.<\/p>\n Texas Baptists, for example, has its own “Western Heritage Ministries” branch that has invested in cowboy churches for 25 years. In 2023, James “Mac” McLeod, consultant for Western Heritage Ministries, estimated there were some 200 cowboy churches<\/a> in Texas affiliated with Texas Baptists.<\/p>\n “The idea that there isn’t religion in the American West assumes that religion is only what happens in a church and isn’t what happens when it comes to people’s morals or values or other ways they might encounter religious ideas,” said Judith Ellen Brunton, an assistant professor in Rice University’s religion department. “So when it comes to that story, the cowboy church is kind of a reaction, or an intervention. It’s kind of a cultural movement that says, \u2018No, there is a kind of western expression of Christianity that is based in the identity of a cowboy that should exist.’ “<\/p>\n \u201cThe Way for Cowboys\u201d<\/p>\n Alongside the pamphlets and copies of the New Testament, a box of doughnuts from Houston-based Shipley welcomed guests to the rodeo’s cowboy church service. Dozens of congregants began trickling into the Caf\u00e9 on the Park at the NRG Center, which, despite its name, is not so much a caf\u00e9 as it is an event space.<\/p>\n Michael Adkison\/Houston Public Media<\/p>\n A sign at the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo points guests toward a cowboy church service on March 15, 2026.<\/p>\n Just after 10 a.m., Adam Perkins and his family approached the pulpit \u2014 or rather, the black curtains at the front of the room \u2014 using chairs as music stands. Perkins, the music director at First Baptist Church at Hughes Springs, a small town in East Texas, began softly playing a keyboard.<\/p>\n “Well, good morning, everybody, are y\u2019all ready to worship the Lord a little bit this Sunday morning?” he said.<\/p>\n If cowboy churches cannot be defined as one thing, this service at the rodeo had an eclectic palate of influences. The opening song Perkins and his family led, “Every Praise,” is a gospel song by Hezekiah Walker, who leads a predominantly Black congregation in Brooklyn. Perkins’ 14-year-old daughter sang “Somebody Say Amen,” a country pop song by Rhett Walker.<\/p>\n The sermon, too, was less “Lonesome Dove” and more reminiscent of Southern Baptist churches, albeit with a handful of rodeo-themed discussions.<\/p>\n Michael Adkison\/Houston Public Media<\/p>\n Danny Biddy preaches at a cowboy church service at the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo on March 15, 2026.<\/p>\n “It doesn\u2019t matter how good you ride a bronc or a bull for 7.9 seconds; if you don\u2019t stay on until the buzzer goes off, it doesn\u2019t matter how good you rode, people just will remember that you came off,” Danny Biddy said in his sermon. “And I want to share something with you, friends: People will remember if you stuck with Jesus, if you stuck with your church, if you stayed on the whole time.”<\/p>\n For Biddy, who grew up in Avinger, Texas, a small town between Longview and Texarkana, preaching to rodeo-goers is a wholesome endeavor. He grew up in the church and by the time he was 18 had decided to become a preacher.<\/p>\n Today, he’s the administrative pastor at Cedar Bayou Baptist Church in Baytown and serves as a chaplain for the Fellowship of Christian Cowboys, which has partnered with the Houston rodeo for more than 40 years<\/a>.<\/p>\n “People just seem to be drawn to that family, welcoming, \u2018Howdy, how are y\u2019all’ atmosphere,” he said.<\/p>\n He wore a white shirt with his name and the fellowship logo stitched into the breast with red thread, blue jeans and a black cowboy hat that he took off when he prayed. As for which category of cowboy churchgoer he falls into \u2014 whether he’s a cowboy or just someone who wants to be one \u2014 Biddy said he qualifies as the former.<\/p>\n “I do feel like I\u2019m really a cowboy,” he said. “But I can\u2019t hit the ground with a rope. So, I really admire these contestants that can do what they can do.”<\/p>\n \t\t\t\t
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