Retirement luncheon

I HAD A dream last night,” says the Bishop, at the retirement luncheon of Vicar John.

“I dreamt I was at the pearly gates. I was given a piece of chalk and told to go up the stairs and at the top I’d find a blackboard. There I had to write down all my sins.

“’All of them?’ I asked.

“’All of them!’ I was told.

“I was up climbing the steps, when, to my astonishment, I saw John, here, going down.

“’Where are you going?’ I asked him.

“John replied, ‘I need more chalk!’”

A very bishop-like joke, I reflect, but well-intentioned and, on the whole, well received.

The meal, at one of the local hotels – once quite posh but now running a little to seed – is just about okay, if only I could raise the appetite for a three-course Sunday lunch.

Still, Vicar John is clearly delighted to see us, and is quite touched by all the fuss.

Somehow that makes it all worthwhile.