There are particular words that Colin Fry does not like. These include difficulty' and proof'.

Instead of the first he prefers challenge' or challenging'; the second takes the form of a challenge when sceptics say to him: "If you think there's no such thing as death prove there is life after death!"

"I gave up trying to prove that years ago. What I do is offer evidence; proof is for the recipient; it's up to people to go away and make up their own minds," he said.

Colin Fry, as you may have gathered by now, is a clairvoyant, a medium who opens a channel of communication between those who are living and those who have passed over. There is no other way of putting it because he is personally convinced that death in the sense of oblivion, the extinction of consciousness, does not exist and never has.

"Death is a transition. We live part of our life in this physical body and then we move on. Infinity is an awfully big place. It's awfully arrogant of us to believe we are the only form of life in the universe and beyond.

"We are surrounded by life but beyond our perception. If there is a mile-and-a-half to know all there is to know about this, none of us knows more than a foot. The phenomenon has never been properly investigated.

"I actually think that people are wanting spirituality in their life - not religion - but spirituality; it's just a question of finding the right avenue," he said.

If that sounds faintly like he's touting for clients when he comes to Bradford on May 26, I do not believe that is his intention. On the basis of a 40-minute telephone conversation I would say that Colin Fry is not setting himself up as a guru and certainly not as a leader.

In which case isn't the format questionable? Why appear at a place of public entertainment if he truly believes that what he does has nothing to do with a spiritual version of sleight of hand?

"What I do isn't an entertainment but I do try to make it entertaining because people who would not dream of coming to see me in a spiritualist church feel more comfortable with that. No one is going to question their beliefs or be threatening."

Professor Richard Dawkins, described as Darwin's Rottweiler', delights in dismaying what he calls "faith-heads" by rubbishing the idea of a designed or created universe. Unlike religious believers and spiritualists who deal in faith, scientists, he says, base their observations on facts.

That's not strictly the case, of course. Einstein's theory of curved space, as part of relativity, remained a scientific belief for more than 90 years until an American space probe sent back information that showed Einstein was right.

But even Einstein declared that God was no a dice player; in other words, this is not a random universe as Richard Dawkins maintains it is. Gene theory was just that, a theory for a long time before there was demonstrable physical evidence to back it up. Ancient Greeks believed in the existence of atoms long before scientists could split them or fuse them.

Faith of a kind is not antithetical to scientific practice but is integral to it.

"I accepted a long time ago that we live in a created universe. We have free will but we neglect and waste it. We are always looking form others to give us the lead.

"We don't apply our free will and say, Nothing goes right in my life!' When you decide to exert your free will, life, the universe, will give you want you want providing you know what you want it for and what you intend to do with it and that you put something back for being allowed to have it," he said.

He believes that we have diminished ourselves by lack of faith, not raised ourselves to a higher pitch of civilised behaviour.

"People are disillusioned in life. They say, What's the point in caring?' You see this in behaviour. There is so much destructive behaviour, kids stabbing each other, road rage; there's no sense of manners or decency.

"My message is that fear of death is a fallacy because we are going to carry on. It's about how we live."

How should be live - boldly, courageously?

"We should live boldly, courageously and kindly," he said.

If his conviction is that the universe is designed, does this apply to individuals - bearing in mind that he also thinks the universe is infinite. In short, does each of us have a designated time and place to die or pass over?

He believes that is so, but adds that beyond each horizon is another one and another one. There is no point in projecting forward to something of which we do not have fore-knowledge.

"Why don't you just live the journey as well as you can?" he added.

Colin Fry is on at St George's Hall on Saturday, May 26, starting at 7.30pm. For tickets ring (01274) 432000.