Take the tube to Bank station in the centre of London's financial district and, if it's a Wednesday afternoon, you might want to pop into St Margaret's Church, Lothbury, for sanctuary from the pursuit of wealth.
If the rector of St Margaret's, the Rev Tom Farrell, is there it's a safe bet that you'll be invited to join in the guitar-and-gospel "Celebrate" service. You might even find yourself eating sandwiches and drinking coffee in the pews, such is the informal atmosphere.
What makes "Celebrate" stand out from the hundreds of church services taking place every day in London is the unusually large number of pin-striped, city-slicker types who don't get a chance to leave their desks until lunch-time - such is the all-consuming pursuit of mammon - and so come in to tend to their spiritual needs.
"Given that a lot of people don't leave their desks at all the large numbers of people who come here at lunch-time is an indication that people are glad to step back from the sheer, hard facts of life," says Tom Farrell, who leads his city congregation most lunch-times in the search for spiritual fulfilment.
"It doesn't surprise me that there are so many. We recognise the fundamental principle of Christian work is that however busy man gets in the pursuit of money the other side won't go away. It's God and Mammon, but they are not necessarily at total cross-purposes."
The people who come to St Margaret's, he says, feel their spiritual need is greater even than the need "to buy bread and butter" - which seems a little surprising since many of the people who attend the service earn six-figure salaries. But Tom Farrell is convinced the Anglican church is not attracting even larger numbers in the city simply because this is supposedly the caring, sharing 1990s. "The church hasn't got people on the rebound" from the selfish, me-first attitude that characterised the city in the 1980s, he argues.
"People's beliefs are not far below the surface. The increase in numbers is partly due to a gradual disenchantment with the old belief that the more you get the happier you are. These days, with job insecurity, people have turned to us. It's almost like saying `let's go back to fundamentals or basics'. "
All this adds up to what Tom Farrell calls a "lovely, spiritual" attitude towards God and money at St Margaret's. The Wednesday lunch-time service lasts for nearly an hour. For those familiar with standing and kneeling then standing up again in church the "Celebrate" service is far from conventional.
Twenty minutes of spiritual music is usually followed by a pause for prayer, then a 10-minute talk slot by an investment banker discussing how he, or she, copes with life on the futures floor. It is a personal testimony and an emotional experience, says Tom Farrell; the service finishes off with another 20 minutes of worship. Then it's back to the office to close another deal.
"In a few weeks, John Perry, who is the understudy to Cliff Richard in Heathcliff is coming in to lead the music," Tom Farrell says by way of incentive.
The thirst for spiritual refreshment amid the materialistic world of the city is taking an even more dramatic form. A spokesman for the Church of England recently referred to the increasing number of people in the financial sector and other professional areas who discover they have religious vocations.
Stockbrokers, solicitors, even SAS officers are answering the call to serve God. According to the church, "it doesn't matter what job they're doing at the time".
Only last week, Jim O'Donnell, a chief executive officer at the stockbrokers HSBC James Capel, surprised his colleagues by announcing he was giving up his £1 million a year lifestyle to become a Catholic priest in his native America. Second-career priests now outnumber the usual crop of theology graduates who seek ordination in the Church of England. Of the 453 people who went forward for ordination last year, 89 were under the age of 29 while 143 were from the 30-39 age group.
The Catholic Church these days also encourages applicants with a little more life experience. Very few 17-year-olds apply to enter the seminaries; the Catholic Church believes men will have a lot more to offer having seen some of the world.
One man who manages to combine God with his career in the money markets is the Rev Stephen Green. An Anglican priest who "occasionally trundles off to put on my cassock at lunch-time" as well as an investment banker, Stephen Green says finance is an imperfect and "morally grey" world. In his book, Serving God? Serving Mammon?, Stephen Green discusses the "permanent source of tension" between money and the church. "Some city slickers breeze in and spend their money on Ferraris," says Mr Green, "but there are others who devote their time and money to the service of others. It is an imperfect world and temptation is everywhere, not just in the city. The challenge is to question what contribution I make to the general welfare of others. It is never an easy question."