Dear Santa,
I know I can’t have everything but some of the following would be lovely to find under my Christmas tree this year…
1) Tippex, because I go through a lot of the stuff when the diary keeps changing and I have to alter my plans.
2) A radical action plan for the Church.
3) A mars bar to help me work, rest, and pray.
4) Socks to replace my holy ones.
5) A voucher entitling me to 50% discount on my M&M contributions.
6) An iPad so that I can watch the footie when I’m sitting at the back of Presbytery meetings.
7) A thicker skin to put on after a great sermon is followed by someone moaning about that new hymn.
8) Some kind of illegal contraption that will stop the gas and electricity meters at the manse from going round so quickly.
9) Super glue to stick the plates to the top of the canes.
10) Tickets to see Michael Buble in concert in Glasgow next year because they were all gone within seconds when I tried to get them online.
11) A villa with a pool in the Med where we can send overtired ministers for a week or two.
12) More ministers recruited with a cheery disposition like your good self.
13) Anything that might look like a radical action plan for the Church.
14) Four candles, Two Ronnies style.
15) Childish I know, a whoopee cushion for the Lord High Commissioner’s seat.
16) A prayer for when I don’t have one.
17) A stationery shop voucher because I just love buying notebooks and pens and twiddly things for my desk.
18) Face paints to put on a smile when I find it hard to put on a real one.
19) A few radical ideas just to get us started on the road to reform in the Church.
20) New tunes for all the dreary and unsingable hymns in CH4.
21) A magic wand.
22) Thermal underwear for all the manse family if number 8 above is out of the question.
23) A lego version of the Church Without Walls.
24) A new website for the Church of Scotland that is easy to navigate.
25) An interest free, non-repayable loan.
26) Yellow clerical shirt that makes me look like a budgie in the pulpit.
27) A really good singing voice for those weddings and funerals where nobody seems to sing but me.
28) A new, bigger spoon for stirring it.
29) Jar of gobstoppers.
30) Heroes.
I’ve probably been naughty, but I promise to try harder to be nice!
Thank you in anticipation!
And have yourself a merry little Christmas!
Robert