A NEW vicar has been appointed to take over the parishes of Belbroughton and Clent.

The Rev Barbara Mapley is currently vicar in the Witham team ministry, in Essex.

She will succeed the Rev Derek Sharples who has retired.

Mrs Mapley will be instituted by the Bishop of Worcester, Dr Peter Selby, during a service on January 8.

She hopes to move to Belbroughton in mid-December.

Mrs Mapley said: "From what I have seen already it is a lovely warm and welcoming community and I am looking forward to being a part of it."

The 53-year-old was brought up in Essex and has lived there for most of her life.

She is a trained physiotherapist who worked at University Hospital, in London, before having children.

Later she became a teaching assistant, a job she held while training for ordination in London. She served as a non-stipendiary curate in the Chelmsford Diocese from 1989 to 1993 and then became a full-time curate at Witham in 1993, becoming a vicar in the team ministry the following year.

Her husband has worked as a chartered accountant and is beginning a new career as a self-employed cabinet maker.

She lists her hobbies as needlework, reading and "fair weather gardening."

In the church, she has a particular interest in the ministry of healing.