An unlikely corner of the Church of England is bucking the trend of declining church attendance and creating new parishes to accommodate the rapidly growing numbers. The trouble is, it is in France.
Poitou-Charentes, in the heart of Cognac country in the south-west, is the latest foreign field that is now the Church of England, complete with the Book of Common Prayer, jam and Jerusalem.
Congregation in a borrowed Roman Catholic church in Magné
Installed last month as the Church of England's newest parish - or more technically chaplaincy - it follows other recent creations in Brittany and Lille. The Loire valley is expected to follow suit.
Yesterday about 60 of the flock congregated for Sunday Communion in a borrowed Roman Catholic church in the village of Magné, set in verdant countryside south of Poitiers.
Amid traditional hymns, tweed jackets and talk of church fetes, the scene could have been archetypically Anglican, except for a panel listing French dead in the First World War and a statue of St Joan of Arc.
The Rev Michael Hopper, a former chaplain to the Bishop of Ripon
The end of the service, led by the Rev Michael Hepper, a former chaplain to the Bishop of Ripon and Leeds, and the curate, the Rev Caroline Gordon-Walker, saw a typical example of English eccentricity.
Bob Fabry-Wright, a retired police officer, who was clad in lurid yellow lycra, wobbled up the ancient nave on his bicycle to mark the end of a five-day sponsored ride around the boundaries of the chaplaincy.
The size of Wales, the new Chaplaincy of Christ the Good Shepherd includes an estimated 25,000 English-speakers, part of the exodus of Britons seeking a new life and better climate abroad, fuelled by television documentaries such as A Place in the Sun.
Six years ago there were 12 regular Anglican worshippers in the region: today that figure has swollen to 300 at Easter and more than 400 at carol services.
While average Sunday church attendance in the Church of England as a whole fell by more than 40,000 between 2000 and 2002, the Diocese of Europe's Archdeaconry in France saw an increase of more than 10 per cent.
While those parts of France historically popular with the British, such as the Riviera, have seen congregations plateau or decline, the new wave of settlers has created buoyant congregations in others.
Sharp increases have been recorded in the Spanish Costas and other parts of the Europe-wide diocese, which is headed by the Bishop of Europe, the Rt Rev Geoffrey Rowell.
Church spokesmen said that such comparisons were unfair because some English dioceses also experienced increases and the spurt in French churchgoing started from a very low base - under 2,000.
But the Diocese of Europe believes it has encouraged growth by operating a much leaner bureaucracy than the rest of the Church of England.
Adrian Mumford, the diocesan secretary, said: "One of the reasons is that each church has to be self-sufficient. The local church pays for the local priest.
We can't help thinking that there is a correlation between growth and decentralised structures. There is more local initiative and a feeling of people flocking together."
Yesterday's communion service at Magne, conducted with the Church of England's new prayer book Common Worship, attracted an eclectic mix of ex-pats, albeit predominantly middle-class and late middle-aged. Former teachers and security consultants mingled with retired policemen and journalists.
Many had left Britain for a fresh start; a number were on their second marriages. Others said they were attracted by the bucolic charms of the area because it reminded them of England before the Second World War.
A number of worshippers admitted that they had gravitated to the church when they moved to France because it offered a ready-made community, an antidote to isolatation and loneliness.
Linda Shepherd, 51, a lay reader who moved from Oxfordshire with her husband four years ago, said: "I need the contact of fellow Christians. I need to share my faith. Although I can do that in a French church, it isn't the same."