Diary of a Sociopathic Vicar – Part 19

Although I am sure that planning is very useful, it is important to be flexible. It is because I am flexible that I am able to adapt to unexpected situations with ease. Reality constantly brings new challenges to navigate, and one such challenge was sitting on my desk now.

In appearance, it was a wooden box, rather like the pirate chests illustrated in children’s books. Planks of wood reinforced with iron strips, and an arched, hinged lid fastened with hasp and padlock. Tipping it side to side, I could feel something shifting inside.

A brief summary might be in order: I needed to disrupt the plans of a secret society – the Sons of Jesus Lemurian - before they disrupted my plans to become Archbishop of Canterbury. To this end I had been looking through the burnt-out ruins of my church for somewhere to hide fake occult scrolls. I had found somewhere suitable, and it was even marked by weird sigils. The only problem was that someone else had beaten me to it and hidden this chest there.

That is the problem with secret societies. They are so inconsiderate, hiding things in my church. And irrational. When you’ve buried a chest under half a ton of stone, why put a padlock on it?

I checked the time and decided I had better get ready for the meeting. We were discussing the idea that June – the Parish Evangelism Officer – had had for a soup kitchen. As an idea, it had merit, which was completely unexpected. I went through to the dining room, which is where I took such activities. Before I burnt the church down, I used to hold them in the church vestry, which was cold and uncomfortable. People are less inclined to long meetings if they are uncomfortable.

Abigail had already arranged chairs around the table, and said, “The kettle’s just boiled, and I’ve made some buns as well.”

“Thank you,” I said, because I couldn’t really object. Even though it would make people feel more welcome. I’d invited Abigail to attend because at least she had a reasonable degree of intelligence.

The doorbell rang, and Abigail answered it. June – low on intelligence and imagination – entered, followed by Mabel, my fiancée – a little dim, but fairly evangelical, which might be useful for this project. A few minutes later, Psycho turned up – a Hells Angel who doesn’t tick all the boxes required for the clinical diagnosis his name suggests, but I hadn’t bothered to tell him. He was happy to believe he was a psychopath, and there was nothing to gain by disillusioning him. He was there for his expertise on running kitchens.

After he’d draped himself across a chair and we’d helped ourselves to Abigail’s buns, I introduced the meeting.

“…and that’s the outline of June’s idea,” I finished. “Running a soup kitchen in Sutley on Saturday, for the purpose of evangelism and encouraging more people to get involved in the church. Let’s have some ideas, then we’ll stir them around and see what works.”

June kicked off by saying, “My Gerald said we should call it Souper Saturday. I think that’s a really good name, don’t you?”

There was general agreement – or a lack of disagreement – on the name, so I wrote it at the top of a flipchart sheet. You can’t beat a flipchart for this kind of thing. There followed a range of ideas, regarding what kind of evangelical materials we might need, the best approach to take with people, should we put Bibles on the tables… I kept to the role of scribe and wrote it all down on the board. Pretty soon the page filled up.

I noticed Psycho had stayed quiet during all of this, so I said to him, “Do you have anything you’d like to add?”

“Sure,” he said, “You’ve got it all wrong.”

This quietened people down, and he smirked a little. I gestured for him to continue.

“It’s a good thing you’ve got me,” he said. “You know why? You’re opening a soup kitchen, and for all your ideas, the only place you’ve mentioned soup is in the title.”

As the others sat there slack-jawed, I rapidly reviewed the situation, and understood the problem was one of institutional blindness. The reason other people find it difficult to admit they are wrong is self-confidence. As I am fully confident in my abilities, on the rare occasions that I do make a mistake, I can assimilate the information and move on. I turned to a new sheet of paper on the flipchart, tossed Psycho the marker pen and sat down.

Psycho started talking while he wrote on the board. His spelling might not have agreed with the Oxford English Dictionary, but his writing was clear enough.

“OK, first, you need somewhere to have the soup kitchen. Souper Saturday. It’s a market day, so rent a couple of market stalls. Tell the council it’s a regular booking, and you’ll get the discounted rate of fifteen quid per stall. And that comes with un-metered electricity thrown in. They’ll even put up a canopy for you. Tables and chairs we can scrounge.”

I settled back in my chair, quite content to let Psycho run the show. Delegation is an important skill and it was clear I’d chosen the right person.

“Next – the soup. What’s the most popular soups?”

“I like a potato and leek soup,” offered June. “Sometimes chicken as well.”

“Good,” said Psycho, “Tomato is a little more popular, but potato and leek is close second, followed by chicken. We’ll avoid anything meat based because the regs are tougher. We could buy in tinned soup, but it’s cheaper and better to make it onsite. Plus, there’s the whole homemade thing.”

In quick succession, he rattled through what was needed - ingredients, sourcing bread rolls, hygiene, council inspections, serving, cutlery, washing up… in short, he gave us a full package.

“I have to say, I’m very impressed,” said Abigail.

“Yes, it’s really good, but what about the evangelism?” asked Mabel.

“You can sell soup, or you can sell bibles. Your choice,” was Psycho’s response.

“Yes and no,” I said. “Forget the tracts. Put up a sign saying, ‘St. James Souper Saturday’ and people will know who we are. Put up an A4 poster for the Sunday service. That’s it.”

“What about counselling?” asked Mabel.

“People don’t talk to strangers,” said Psycho. “Put a sign up about that, they’ll never say a word. Sell them soup for a few weeks, you’re not a stranger, and they’ll talk anyway.”

June sat there smiling blissfully. I’m not sure she understood one word in five of what we’d discussed, but she was happy.

After what had been a remarkably successful meeting, I returned to my study and the box sitting on my desk. Rather than break the padlock off I attacked the rear hinges with a crowbar.

Inside was an ancient leather-bound book with no inscription. I turned to the start of the text. Latin, predictably enough.

I translated it as, “The Gospel of Jesus of Lemuria”.

This was rather inconvenient.

Disclaimer: Although the concept of the soup kitchen has merit, and delegation is a sensible route, it is hard to consider “Psycho” as the correct person to drive the project when he did not even mention cock-a-leekie.