IT'S an unusual priest who high-fives his parishioners, calls himself a heretic and swims naked with piranhas.

But here's a man who has done it all - and then some.

Father Denis Blackledge has been carving out a niche for himself at Corpus Christi Church in Boscombe for several months. He is parish priest there - and a welcome one.

Warm, dry-humoured and direct, he's a breath of fresh air blowing through an institution which, in his words "used to be so stuffy".

"But now the windows are open," he says.

As a Jesuit he is part of a world-wide missionary order and obedience is their way. "But I'm a bit fed up with moving," says the ex-Stonyhurst superior. "I've moved 16 times since joining.

"However, I've a great parish here. There are lovely people - very self-propelled, and with a willingness to give their time and talent to others.

"Bournemouth is a great place to live. But it has a needy side - a vulnerable underbelly of under-privileged people. One day you could be mending a broken loo and the next a broken life. We do a lot of quiet work behind the scenes."

Yet he's also had a strong media presence for many years, mainly in BBC radio and on ITV's My Favourite Hymns.

Key media moments include co-fronting a three-hour Diana funeral transmission and a two-hour special on the death of Pope John Paul II.

Now he's in Bournemouth, he can be heard on Hope FM every Wednesday presenting Classical Delights.

"And when people see me in the Echo they'll say: Oh there he is, showing off again'. But I say sod 'em!"

He's joking, of course. Father Denis, like Corpus Christi Church, is open and embracing of everyone.

"We do a lot of listening ear work and see plenty of people who have forgotten what faith is. There's a baptism a week and lots of babies, which is wonderful!

"People come from other parishes to us as we have a good record of journeying in faith'. That, or we're on a good bus route!"

Over the years, Fr Denis has visited fellow Jesuits in Guyana, South Africa, Thailand and Zimbabwe.

"I lived in a wooden shack 14,000 feet up in the Andes. I also had to brave machete-wielding township dwellers in South Africa, just after the war of independence when some of our men were shot dead."

He lived with the poor in Paraguay. And there were close encounters in the river Takutu on the Guyana-Brazil border.

"I swam in it five times and they never told me what was in that river! There were piranhas, electric eels, sting rays and Heineken fish - so called because they reach parts of human anatomy others can't reach!

"I wouldn't have minded but all I had on were my goggles."

Scarier events were to come when he lived 100 metres from Blackpool pier. "I was regularly propositioned by drunken hens," he laughed.

Little did they know he loved classics, was a steam train anorak and old enough to be their grandfather.

And not forgetting he'd taken a vow of poverty, obedience and chastity when he was 20 years old.

"That's one of the hard parts of being a priest," he says. "Not having a partner and children.

"Christmas is the hardest time. I really feel the pinch then.

"Following Jesus is a bloody nuisance at times. He's asked things of me which are really hard to give.

"People think priests live from the neck upwards but they're made like everyone else."

He's learned to cope with falling in love as a priest: "It's an occupational hazard, I suppose. But had I married I would have had to give all this up and I would have pined for it.

"I've had 35 years of priesthood - that's like a marriage."

The fondness he shares with his parishioners is very evident. At the last mass of term, 450 children attended, exchanging high fives and other pleasantries.

"If a child wants a hug I give them a hug but it has to be in public," he says. "I hate it when people tar the whole priesthood with the paedophile tag. I've known people to commit suicide over it."

After the service, he invites me to his house and I make the tea while he freshens up. "After wearing all that clobber, my armpits aren't exactly charmpits," he laughs.

This 65-year old has degrees in classics, philosophy and theology, and his favourite things are the seaside, a glass of wine and Blackburn Rovers.

"I'm sure I'm a heretic. I could have been shot for some of the things I have said. I'm flawed, I've messed up. But you only live once, you're here to make the most of it, and I can't abide miseryguts.

"And when people come to the church, my aim is to send them out happier than they went in."