ONE of the region's most respected clerics has announced he is to retire next year.

The Bishop of Knaresborough, the Right Reverend Frank Weston, will step down next May.

He has served as assistant to the Bishop of Ripon and Leeds, the Right Reverend John Packer, since 2000, having managed the diocese himself while a replacement was found for the Right Reverend David Young, who retired the year before.

His duties included overseeing a change of name for the diocese. He also led an inquiry into the allegations surrounding the Dean of Ripon, the Very Reverend John Methuen, whose management style was reported to have prompted an exodus of senior staff.

Bishop Packer described Bishop Weston's contribution to the Church as "immense''.

"Although he has been with us for a comparatively short time, his wisdom, experience and pastoral sensitivity have been appreciated and I personally have particular reason to be grateful for the way in which he has encouraged and guided me," he said.

Much of Bishop Weston's 40-year ministry has revolved around education; after a curacy in Manchester in the early 1960s, he became chaplain and then principal of the College of the Ascension in Selly Oak, Birmingham.

In 1976, he became principal of the Edinburgh Theological College, training ordinands in the Scottish Episcopal Church, before becoming Archdeacon of Oxford and Residentiary Canon of Christ Church, Oxford, from 1982 until 1997.