Sunbathers wishing to attend a Sunday service without the bother of getting dressed were offered an alternative form of religious experience yesterday: an inflatable church on the beach.

The “bouncy church” is 30 metres (100ft) long and 15 metres wide, and comes complete with an altar, an apse and a confessional. Using compressed air it takes only five minutes to inflate, according to Father Andrea Brugnoli, who organised the service on a beach at Cagliari, the Sardinian capital.

Father Brugnoli, who heads a Catholic youth organisation called Sentinelle del Mattino (“Sentinels of the Morning”), formed in 2000 with the blessing of the late Pope John Paul II, said that the group already offered “spiritual comfort” at motorway service stations, discotheques and seaside resorts. An inflatable church was a logical next step, he said.

Yesterday the structure had to be deflated hastily because of a strong mistral that threatened to lift it into the sky. Father Brugnoli, however, was undeterred. “We want to offer a sacred place where young people in search of God will find a welcome, wherever they happen to be,” he said.

He said that the blow-up church had cost tens of thousands of euros but would “prove its worth as an investment”. He acknowledged that some traditionalists disapproved. “Some say the next step will be inflatable Christians. But we are not put off.”

Monsignor Giuseppe Mani, the Archbishop of Cagliari, who visited the bouncy church, said that he supported the idea. The scheme was inspired by inflatable churches pioneered in Britain for use at weddings - although, unlike its British counterparts, the Italian church is open to the elements and has no roof or spire.

Not all Catholics welcomed the innovation. “Terribilis est locus iste: hic domus Dei est, et porta caeli” (“A church is a place of awe, it is the house of God and the door to Heaven”) ran one dissident posting on the Cagliari diocesan website. Protesters said that it was squalid to erect a church in the midst of sunloungers, beach umbrellas and men and women in “various stages of undress”. If sunbathers wanted to worship God, they should “get dressed, leave the beach and go to a proper church”, one wrote.

Father Brugnoli said that the inflatable church would not be used for Holy Communion but as “a place of prayer, where we can worship the Most Holy together”. A free meal and talk were also offered.

Since young people tended to stay on the beach late at night, services would be held until three or four in the morning “with the Moon and the stars for a roof. We believe we have done a beautiful thing, which we hope will please the Lord. There is no copyright on faith,” he said.

Organisers said that the inflatable church would make its next appearance at resorts on the Adriatic coast.

Unusual places of worship

— The world’s first inflatable church was designed by Michael Gill, the British entrepreneur, for novelty weddings. Capable of holding 60 people standing, it went on display in 2003 and was dedicated by a Church of England minister

— Resembling a concertina, the peach-coloured pebbledash church in Ísafjördur, Iceland, has caused controversy since its construction in 1987 – 30 graves were cemented over to make way for it

— Legends surrounding the secret churches at Lalibela in Ethiopia hold that a 13th-century prince was transported to Heaven for three days so God could instruct him in churchbuilding. Proclaimed king on his return, he created a maze of semi-underground churches

Sources: agencies, The Rough Guide to Iceland, Times database