CHRIST the King is a Marie Celeste among church buildings, the roof that symbolised the crown of thorns a bed of nails instead. The priest's chair remains in its accustomed place, celebrant no longer; children's drawings and dried flower arrangements still hang on the decaying walls, candles stand matchless and moribund around the sanctuary.

Occasionally there's a bucket to catch the incoming water, though the battle is long lost. Rain stopped pray. Though several attempts were made to seal the essentially flat roof, funds dried up long before the church interior did.

Though the church is abandoned, hope is not. Though the problems are in turn king-sized, so is the determination to resolve them. "We are a big village and expanding, we need a Church presence and to keep that spirit of togetherness which pit villages always had," says Maureen Robinson, one of the wardens.

Completed just 30 years ago, the architectural award-winning Church of Christ the King is in Bowburn, south-east of Durham City and in the parish of Cassop cum Quarrington.

Some called it the Pineapple Church, though its fruit has been bitter-sweet. Now they must find £1.1m for its replacement.

Alongside it - egregiously, some might say - is a free standing fibre glass sculpture that towers above the roofs of the surrounding housing estate, resembles a rusting rocket crashed to earth and cost £950 in the 1960s.

When the church is demolished, the rocket, repainted, will remain. The present architect disagrees. "It's part of Bowburn's heritage," says Fr James Thompson, the priest-in-charge.

The church held its final service in early September, though for years the rain had fallen upon righteous and unrighteous alike. "If it rained during a service the servers and I had to move the altar, sometimes as often as five times," says Fr Thompson. "The problem was that it never rained in the same place twice. It depended on the wind. The final service was a fantastic occasion, one of the happiest, saddest days of my life."

Maureen Robinson, who still daily lights a votive candle there, gazes wistfully around the dank and desolate old church. "They won awards for this," she says simply. "The architect got medals."

A paragraph in the excellent weekly newsletter recalls the scripture about a seed having to die before it bears fruit. "It may seem to the outside world that we are dying because we are closing our present church, but we have got to let the world know that the closure is just a means of growing."

For the moment they worship on Sundays in the village Methodist church - "smaller but warmer and drier than what we're used to" says Maureen - and on weekdays in the vicarage, where Fr Thompson's dining room table serves as an altar. On other days the vicarage hosts bingo evenings, or coffee mornings.

Last Sunday was the feast of Christ the King, a recent addition to the Church's calendar. The Rt Rev Martyn Jarrett, Bishop of Beverley, is there to celebrate the eucharist and to confirm four candidates - the first time there's been either bishop or confirmation at Bowburn Methodists.

Bishop Martyn is officially a Provincial Episcopal Visitor, unofficially a flying bishop - one of three appointed within the Church of England to lead parishes opposed to women priests.

On Friday he'd been to Southport, the following day he'd be in Sheffield. That morning he'd driven from his Leeds home in an hour and 20 minutes, thus suggesting sound reason for the soubriquet.

The church is full, almost every seat taken, among the congregation Ivy and Harold Bainbridge, who celebrated their diamond wedding on Thursday. As is almost always the case in churches opposed to women priests, the gathering is largely female.

Bishop Martyn tells them that few Sundays are more perfect for a confirmation than that one, is at once interrupted by the clamour of passing fire engines - "I don't usually have that dramatic effect" he says - and then talks about Augustine's confessions, or at least, like scrumping, about those fit for innocent ears.

There were much worse, he says. "Anyone who believes that vandalism among young people is a recent problem should read the confessions of Augustine."

Augustine also became a bishop. "It happens to the most unlikely people," adds Bishop Martyn. Betty Barber, Rebecca Morrow and Tina and Ray Rodgers are duly confirmed, take their first communion, adjourn to the vicarage for wine - no alcohol on Methodist premises - and to the Bowburn Hall Hotel for lunch.

The Methodists, good neighbours, are arriving as the Anglicans leave. "It's like bedlam," says Maureen, though what it's really like is the second house at the pictures.

The Diocese of Durham had at first declined to allow a new church to be built, its change of heart coinciding - at least - with the arrival of the Ven Stephen Conway as Archdeacon of Durham. He and Bishop Martyn, they say, have been "absolutely wonderful".

Three quarters of the £1.1m will come, they hope, from the National Lottery. They need to find over £250,000 and since that's an awful lot of eyes down, Maureen has the address of every Anglican church in Christendom and will be writing to them all.

"We bought 16,000 second class stamps, so many that the local sub-postmaster had to ask head office if it was all right. I've done England and Wales, started on Australia but that's on hold just now. There's more money in America."

Their resilience is remarkable, their drive four wheeled. The sad old church will be demolished within a year, its replacement, they hope, built on the same site by 2007. There'll be an oval sanctuary, says Maureen, a lady chapel, a hall for church dos and village dos. Most of all, she says, there'll be a pointy roof - and in Bowburn, just now, nothing could be pitched any higher.

* Donations to the Bowburn church building appeal can be made to the Treasurer, c/o the Vicarage, Prince Charles Avenue, Bowburn, Co Durham. Sunday service is at 9.15am in the Methodist church. Further information on www.christ-the-king-cqb.com

THE historic Methodist church at Newbiggin-in-Teesdale hosts its ever-memorable "Coffee and carols" service on Tuesday, December 14 at 10.30am, with musical items by the Middleton Worship Group and seasonal readings by Lorne Tallentire. The mince pies are abundant, too.

ORGANISED by Howden-le-Wear Mothers' Union, Bearpark and Esh Colliery Band plays at St Mary's church, Howden, at 6pm on Wednesday at 7pm. Tickets, £3.50, are available from church members or by ringing (01388) 762834.

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