I am a Christian. When I am here in Bath I attend Bath City Church, a charismatic new church. It's so charismatic at the end of the service some people go to the front, get prayed for and fall over! More modern Christian songs tend to be sung rather than traditional hymns, and they are nearly all in a big bunch at the start of the service, interspersed only with testimony, an announcement saying "We'll take up the offering now" and the odd prayer. When a traditional hymn is sung it is sung in the style of a more modern song. The service typically lasts 2.5 hours.

The sermon is sometimes done by Paul Wakely, sometimes by Dave Dalley. When Dave does it, the individual points are not boring, but their vast quantity makes the sermon as a whole boring. A typical Dave Dalley line is "We'll start now, at 11:30, and I'll be brief" followed later by "Sorry, is it 1 o'clock already? I've only got 2 more points left, but if you've got children to collect please go and get them."

I have seen my faith grow from strength to strength in Bath, and on Sunday 22nd November 1998 I was baptised by total immersion. Unfortunately Dave Dalley, the only elder on the leadership team, has a mobile phone. I think God's giving me a challenge by taking me to a church where one of the ministers is a poser!

Although I am not on the Christian Union committee I would describe myself as being the "next best thing". From September 1998 until February 1999 I was living with 2 committee members: President Tim and Tom (Without Limits Enquiries Course Coordinator), and quite close to many of the other committee members.

When I am at home I attend an evangelical free church in Rugby, called Bilton Evangelical Church. It's not quite so charismatic up there, although it is a quite close match. A few traditional hymns creep in here and there, but again it is mainly modern songs. The songs up there are spread out over 30 minutes, interspersed with notices and prayers. The service is meant to be an hour but it always seems to overrun!

And in Southampton I attend Above Bar Church, which again is not very charismatic. I miss falling asleep during sermons! They tend to sing a fair mix of traditional hymns and modern songs, and again they tend to be spread out. The evening service seems to be geared more towards young people, with more modern songs. They use two hymn books - Mission Praise and Hymns for Today's Church. The latter seems to have over-modernised many of the hymns, painfully stripping them of their Thee's and Thou's and adding or changing a few words so that they still fit the music. It could be done away with completely, since all the hymns in the book are also in Mission Praise. When I started going there they also had a set of slides which they would project on their big screen, and when they wanted to sing a song which was neither in the hymn books nor on the slides, they would give you a sheet of paper with the song on. However, a computerised projection system has now been introduced as a replacement for both the slides and the handouts. Ultimately it will replace the hymn books also, but the people responsible for typing the hymns into the computer are a bit slow! Thankfully the minister has no mobile phone - in fact he doesn't like them at all, and gets very annoyed when somebody leaves their mobile phone switched on in the service and it rings when he's preaching!