The Vatican's Pontifical Council for Social Communications has given its seal of approval to the application, which was created by Italian priest Reverend Paolo Padrini with a little help from a web designer.

So what does iBreviary give (aside from a better chance of salvation)? Well it's available in Italian, English, Spanish, French and, of course, Latin with Portuguese and German likely be included in version 1.1.

On a wing and a prayer

A free trial period in Italian saw 10,000 downloads, but the application will now cost 74p with Padrini's proceeds going to charity.

Monsignor Paul Tighe, secretary of the Vatican's Pontifical Council for Social Communications praised the new application, stating that the church "is learning to use the new technologies primarily as a tool or as a mean of evangelising."

The Vatican has long been an early adopter of technology – embracing the web, SMS and DVDs early in their life cycles.