Rather like that bit in the Bible, the lady of this house reckons that whenever two or three are gathered together, at least one will have played football for Shildon.

So it unexpectedly proved on Sunday, when the father of one of those to be baptised had worn the Railwaymen's colours with pride and the child's grandfather remained club president.

They'd won 4-0 away the previous afternoon; it had the makings of a very good weekend.

We were at the Darlington United Reformed Church in Northgate, not just for the baptism of Shanaya Zahi Atkinson-Jones and Jade Alice Byrne nor for the harvest festival which coincided, but for the first service led by the Rev Tjarda Murray, the new minister.

Tjarda is from Rotterdam. Though she speaks English like so many Dutch people - perfectly - there was a great deal to remember, much that would be strange.

A baptism of fire, as it were.

The United Reformed Church was formed nationally in 1972 by the amalgamation of the Congregational and Presbyterian churches.

The cheerfully welcoming church in Darlington - 120ft spire, even the railings Grade II listed - is sometimes called the Butterfly Church because many generations of peacocks have made their year-round home there.

Folk even talk of seeing peacocks flitting through the candlelight at Christmas Day services. It's the heating, apparently, turned up sufficiently each week to make a peacock's fancy turn to Spring.

Tjarda had officially been welcomed the week previously; now it was time to spread her own wings, too.

She was brought up in the Dutch Reformed Church, recalls as an 18-year-old telling fellow students that the world was made in seven days. "They reacted incredulously; how could I believe that with all the scientific evidence for evolution?"

It altered her view of the Bible - "for the first time I realised that there is a greater truth hidden" - but not her faith.

After coming to England to train as a nurse, she married a South African academic at Cambridge University, became North-East co-ordinator of Christian Aid and was a non-stipendiary URC minister in Hull. Darlington is her first full-time post, the cosmopolitan Northgate congregation - there are strong Scottish and West Indian elements - thrilled to bits to have her.

Normally, it's said, around 90 attend Sunday morning worship. The numbers are doubled for 10.45am Sunday's service, though there are so many latecomers that 10.45 appears to be sub-titled "or whenever is most convenient."

Among those delayed is one of the godparents. "They have come a long way," says Tjarda, but they'd (it transpired) come the day before.

On Sunday morning they only had to get the quarter of a mile from the Kings Head.

Shanaya is three, Jade 16; they are cousins. Though Shanaya's baptism is clearly her adopted parents' decision - Floyd Atkinson-Jones is the former footballer, his wife the club president's daughter - Jade has made her own decision.

"I've wanted to be baptised for a long time," she says. "It was lovely to do it like this."

The organist before the service plays Londonderry Air, a tune to which several hymns have been written, and the theme from Last of the Summer Wine, which for the time of year could hardly be more appropriate. Clearly it is a vibrant church; they begin with more notices than a mass redundancy.

A peacock floats by the window, another lies dead, outstretched on some flowers. "It looked so beautiful," says Maranny Jones, the assistant church secretary, "I couldn't bear to move it out of the church."

There are harvest gifts, too, brought to the front in carrier bags. Once it was just fruit and veg; now Heinz spaghetti bolognese makes an appearance, too.

Save for a momentary mix-up in which she almost names the wrong youngster, the new minister is brilliant; Shanaya pirouettes in her splendid christening frock, Jade answers her vows confidently.

"Shall we go to say hello to everybody?" asks Tjarda when the baptism is complete.

"No" says Shanaya. They go walkabout, anyway.

Afterwards there is tea and biscuits for everyone downstairs, and at Ochis - a Caribbean restaurant in the town centre - a christening party with a steel band brought up from Leeds.

Tjarda, also invited, offers thanks for diversity and unity, friends and fellowship; the column creeps in to wet the newcomers' heads and to talk Shildon football with grandad. It's a lovely, lively, internationally flavoured occasion and we shall hear a lot more of Tjarda Murray.

* Sunday service at Northgate United Reformed Church is at 10.45am. The Rev Tjarda Murray this afternoon holds an open day at the manse from 2-5pm. The church also has a daughter church at Springfield, in the north of the town, in a tin hut that was once the works canteen at Robert Stephenson's locomotive works in Newcastle. The church orchestra has completed a CD, Northgate Praise - details from Bob or Maranny Jones, 01325 464137.

Published: 29/09/2001