The overall winner of the 2009 Surefish Local Church Website of the Year Award was announced on Wednesday as St Andrew's Church in Manchester which is designed and managed by an 18 year-old, Nick Salisbury.
The site www.st-andrew.co.uk was short listed by a panel of experts, then visitors to the Christian Aid Surefish.co.uk and Church Times websites voted it as the final winner.
St Andrew's which is in Rochdale, was one of six website winners named at the award ceremony yesterday. There were also two special awards and three entries that were highly commended.
Hosting the awards in London, BBC Songs of Praise presenter Pam Rhodes said: "We're getting information on everything now from the computer. We reach for the mouse and not the directory. What we've seen today is excellent in terms of innovation, business enterprise, imagination and technical skill."
Nick, of Alkrington, Manchester, who has just completed his A Levels, was not at the award ceremony because it was being voted on up to midnight of Tuesday night and so he learned about his success when his local vicar, the Rev Ian Fellows phoned - and at first thought it was a joke.
Nick said he spent a couple of hours a week on the St Andrew's Church site after relaunching it for Easter Sunday. "I've been designing sites since I was eight years old. I suppose it's like designing a house - you get the same sort of rewards."
He said a popular feature of the site was Little Ian, a cartoon character of the church's vicar.
Among the winners was another A level student, 17-year-old Sam Matthews from Itchen, Southampton, who won the youth website category with the site, Connect Southampton.
Sam said he devotes about 10 hours a week to maintaining and upgrading the site. "Our team represents churches across Southampton," he said. "It's a labour of love for me. We are about linking everyone into Connect Southampton."
Andrew Jackson, editor of Surefish - Christian Aid's community website - said: "These awards are a celebration of the online presence of churches locally, regionally and nationally, as well as recognising the best Christian blogs, the best youth website and the most innovative church website."
Paul Handley, editor of Church Times, which jointly organised the award with Christian Aid, said: "There were tons of brilliant ideas in the sites that we judged - and I hope people will look at these winners and be inspired by them."
In addition to the publicised categories, the ceremony gave two special awards. The first went to Langside Parish Church, Glasgow, in recognition of the use of its website following a devastating fire in the church's sanctuary.
