Woman priest target of hate campaign

PENZANCE, England, Oct. 2 (UPI) -- A woman Anglican priest in England who was the target of a hate campaign last year received a death-threat concealed in a Bible, officials said.

The Rev. Yvonne Hobson discovered the note on a postcard between Sunday services at the church of St. Pol de Leon at Paul in Cornwall, The Daily Mail reported. The postcard is being tested for DNA and other forensic evidence, police said.

Hobson gave up active church work for months after several threatening incidents last autumn, including burning candles placed on the porch of her house in Penzance and in her car.

She also got letters from someone apparently opposed to female priests.

Hobson had just become the curate at St. Pol when she received the new threat.

The Rev. Tim Heaney, the church's vicar, condemned the hate campaign.

"We serve a God of love who would not condone any actions of hatred -- whatever our interpretation of how he wants us to run the church," he said. "It's impossible to get into the mind of someone like this. It's one thing to have an opinion but another to think it can justify the things they have done."