No more. When the prudent son of the manse was a student, the Kirk had 1.34 million members. The current membership is less than half that. More worrying for the Church of Scotland's future, only 7,500 babies were christened last year, 500 fewer than the year before. Not all of those will go on to become actively involved, but this is the pool from which recruits are drawn.

For centuries, Christianity has been primarily a white, European and
North American religion. But the explosive growth of Africa and Asia,
combined with the success of evangelization there, will change that
forever.

By 2050, it's expected that only one in five Christians worldwide
will be white. And places like St. Joseph's a regular parish in an
unremarkable Nigerian town ? will be the Christian mainstream.

The Rev. Robert Placer of the Philadelphia area is Stoddart's teammate in the effort. He will lead the fellowship, which is mainly a ministry to the unchurched. About 20 people have shown interest so far.

Stoddart says conservative Episcopalians may be drawn to the fellowship, too, if they are disappointed over the Rt. Rev. Gene Robinson, the openly gay bishop of New Hampshire, consecrated in 2003.

"I am pretty close to the edge. I know about the black dog. I also know that you can't let it get on your back because it will bring you down," he revealed in a remarkably candid interview.

Although Dr Hollingworth resigned, he has denied being involved in the cover-up in Brisbane. In fact, he now believes that his downfall was due to a 'powerful secular culture', which could not tolerate the religious in the public square.