THE eighth Bishop of Blackburn will be enthroned in Blackburn Cathedral next month. But what does a bishop do, and what does the appointment mean to the man or woman in the street? SIMON HAWORTH reports. . .

WHEN Nicholas Reade, a 56-year-old father-of-one from East Sussex, bangs on the door of Blackburn Cathedral with an ancient stone in four weeks, he will be making history.

The Venerable Nicholas Reade will be minutes from becoming the eighth Bishop of Blackburn and will enter into a holy lineage begun by the original apostles of Jesus Christ.

As a bishop Mr Reade will become one of the modern church's official successors to the 12 disciples. His role will be to work for the Church of England, in a diocese stretching from the Cumbrian borders to Todmorden in West Yorkshire, spreading the Christian message and providing leadership to clergy, church goers and society.

Mr Reade was chosen through a long process of appointment secretaries travelling from Downing Street and Lambeth Palace to find out what sort of bishop was needed here. The choice of Mr Reade for Blackburn was given the approval of Tony Blair and the Queen.

It is tradition for the new bishop to enter Blackburn Cathedral for the first time by knocking on its door with the 'Saxon Hammer' - made up of a Stone Age hammerhead from the bed of the River Ribble and a shaft of Yew tree from Whalley Abbey. The stone is used to symbolise the River Ribble which divided the province of York and Canterbury in medieval times and today divides the archdeaconries of the diocese.

But compared to the tool, the Blackburn Diocese, with 250 parishes, 200 clergy and 34,000 weekly church goers, is in its infancy. Established in 1926 it is one of the country's youngest.

Its first bishop was the Rt Rev Percy Mark Herbert, a Cambridge graduate, who was welcomed by the town's civic grandees and clergymen, with a grand procession.

In his book 'Viewed from the Water Tank', which charts the history of the Church of England in Blackburn, Geoffrey Williams records how Bishop Herbert used his speeches to address growing social problems of drinking and gambling. This role of offering the faithful spiritual guidance, as well as the secular world moral instruction, is still seen as a vital role of the bishop.

Canon Michael Taylor, 73, who has served in the Blackburn Diocese for 43 years and worked with five bishops in those years, said: "The new bishop will to be interested in how local people are being treated and what is going on in the country as a whole."

Following Bishop Herbert in 1942 was Bishop Wilfred Askwith who faced the problems of post-war East Lancashire. Then came The Rt Rev Walter Baddeley in 1954 and Bishop Charles Claxton in 1960. In 1971 the Rt Rev Robert Martineau became the first bishop to move to the five-bedroomed detached 'Bishop's House' in Salesbury in the Ribble Valley, where Mr Reade will move with his family.

In 1982 the Rt Rev Stewart Cross arrived and addressed the issue of the growing number of people from non-Christian faiths in towns in East Lancashire.

And in 1989 came the Ven Alan Chesters who served for 14 years before retiring last year as the church faced a crisis over the legitimacy of homosexual bishops.

Canon Taylor said: "The arrival of a new bishop is very exciting. The bishop has enormous authority and responsibility. We have had a series of excellent bishops and it adds to the diocese's history when a new bishop arrives.

"The bishop will make sure there is a ministry of outreach to encourage people to go to church which is important because there are falling numbers in the population of church goers.

"Some people prefer to stay away from church, but they would be very perturbed if it was to disappear."

The Ven Nicholas Reade will be consecrated as a bishop at York Minster on March 2 and enthroned as Bishop of Blackburn on March 27.