The Vicar of St Mary's Parish Church is leaving Burley-in-Wharfedale after serving the village for more than nine years.

The Reverend Peter Sut-cliffe is moving on to take up a new position as priest-in-charge of St Andrew's Church, Yeadon.

Mr Sutcliffe, 44, his wife Alison, a teacher, and their two children, Clare, 20, and Tim, 18, will all move to St Andrew's Vicarage in March.

Reflecting on nearly a decade of working and living in Wharfedale, he said: "My time in Burley has been immensely exciting and rewarding.

"But I shall have been here ten years in the summer and after all you need a new challenge and the people here need a new vicar, too, to give a different perspective on things and think things through again, keep them fresh.

"Inevitably, after almost ten years, you get to know people very well indeed and it will be difficult to say goodbye, but we look forward to making new friends in Yeadon.

"I am very much looking forward to starting up there, it is a very different place to Burley with a different set of challenges and opportunities."

Mr Sutcliffe was team vicar of St Nicholas's in Warwick for four years before taking up his post in Burley.

During his spell in Warwick Mr Sutcliffe was also the religious producer for BBC Radio Coventry and Warwickshire.

Before that, he had spent three years as team vicar of the Tettenhall Regis parish in the Diocese of Lichfield.

He was ordained in 1982 after training at Lincoln Theological College, and was then a curate in first the Lichfield and then the Brad-ford Dioceses, the latter at Christ Church, Skipton.

A lifelong Bradford City Football Club supporter, he must now come to terms with being on the 'wrong' side of the Leeds/Bradford divide.

He said: "I will be further away from Valley Parade at Yeadon but these deep-seated foolish things stay with you, you can't get rid of them, and I will continue to be a Bradford City man through and thr-ough."

Turning to more serious matters, he paused to consider his finest moment in Burley.

He said: "The thing I think I will remember most, and most fondly, is the establishment of the Open Door project in Station Road, which was one of my ideas.

"It's a place where people who are lonely or in need of some human company can go and know they will receive a friendly welcome, which we can all do with at one time or another."

Mr Sutcliffe will give his last service in the village on March 2, and will begin his duties in Yeadon from Monday, April 7.

A spokesman for Bradford Diocese said no new vicar for St Mary's had been appointed yet.

In the meantime St Mary's Curate, the Reverend Roger Brookes, will be in charge of the church.