Wednesday, 21st August, 2002 13:00 BST
Forest folk - Peter Murphy | |
|  | | Peter Murphy at the Church of All Saints, Minstead |
| | Take a closer look at the people who live and work in the New Forest.
We chatted to four people who live and work in the Forest. |
| | | Peter Murphy is Rector of three Parishes in the New Forest: Lyndhurst, Emery Down and Minstead. Before that he was at Hythe. He has spent nearly 20 years in and around the New Forest.
"I was born in Guernsey at the beginning of the war and evacuated to Brighton. I was educated theologically at King's College London, then went to Paddington for five years as assistant Curate.
 | | Inside the church |
I was in Basingstoke for 10 years before moving to Hythe and now here I am. I shall retire in four years, or so. So there's me, a potted history!
The days when a Vicar would spend most of his time wandering around the Parish annoying people are gone.
Until the 1950s there were three Vicars running these Parishes. Now the population is bigger and there's just me though I have two colleagues, Camilla and Felicity who were ordained recently. We work together as a team. Churches are not just run by Vicars.
 | | Camilla helps |
Sundays are a bit like 'Meals on Wheels'! I start at 8am at one Church, on to another for 9:45, another at 11:15, occasionally I do baptisms at 3pm and there's usually Evensong at 6pm. Some of it we share between us. I never get a chance to go to a car boot sale, very sad!
When going round the Churchyard you see names of families who are still here and were here 400 years ago. All the people burried here have lived and left their mark and in their day were probably wonderful people. I like watching people grow, spiritually. It's a delightful thing.
I love the culture of the Commoners and to immerse myself in that culture as much as possible. I wish somehow that, within the culture of the Forest, there could be a place for younger people - the children of the present Foresters.
The price of property in the Forest makes such a difference to these people. They don't have the capital so they have to move. I'm not certain what that will do in the long-term.
Two thirds of our marriages take place with people who don't actually live here. Legally I'm not supposed to marry anyone who's not resident in my Parish. I'm to say "no, sorry I can't marry you, go across to the pub you can get married there!"
That's so ridiculous and it does seem to me that I have an overruling responsibility to do everything in my power to say yes, even if it does mean being flexible with the rules. The Diocese know that I play silly games but that I don't mind admitting it and I'm unrepentant!
 | | Peter did a net wedding |
My son works with computers and heard of someone asking if anyone would marry them over the internet.
He rang me and asked if I could do it. It was in the early days of my using the internet so I had a bit of help from him.
We set it up - he was American, she was English. They wanted the marriage to be solemnized in America and the UK at the same time.
We couldn't do that legally in this country so they were legally married in a Registry Office before the service was carried out on the internet.
Then we had a Vicar in America and me in England. The couple were in Taunton and their family and friends linked in from all over the place. We called it a "Net Wedding".
We had set up chat rooms and people all over the world became interested. Halfway through someone dug through the phone line in Taunton and cut us off for an hour but by the end 400 people were logged on. They could all send comments, it was scrolling through at a rate! It became an internet reception.
I baptised their baby a year ago. They wanted that on the internet but you can't get virtual water!
We have various works of art in the three Parish Churches. St Michaels at Lyndhurst has windows by William Morris and a fresco by Frederick Lord Leighton.
 | | The Saxon font |
At Minstead we have a Saxon font. To keep it safe it was burried for more than 200 years in the Vicarage garden, then discovered after the reformation, by an Abbott who was digging the shrub bed when his spade struck the edge.
You can see where the damage has been repaired. The font was returned to the Church
in 1893.
All three Churches are centres of the Christian community. We wrote a 'millennium promise' that we would carry out 1000 good deeds to celebrate the year 2000. We have a book in which the good deeds are recorded.
We have our own website and we publish our Parish magazine on the internet. It's very useful, I get quite a bit of feedback. We did it quite a long time ago and if anybody out there would like to reorganise it and make it a bit more exciting we'd be delighted.
I've grown to love the Forest. It was a complete eye opener when I came here, to discover this sub-culture of Commoning. The Commoners are people upon whom the whole character of the Forest depends.
This is the most gorgeous place on God's Earth, as far as I can see. It's a privilege to do all the things I do here and be paid for it!" | | | |
|
|
