Duly collated ... the warmest of welcomes

Done it again. Staggered to bed without the energy even to look into the study, let alone blip. Now I'm in a rush, with a ferry to catch - but here's the round up.

On the most glorious of days, with Holy Trinity church and its grounds looking at their best, and the church building so dried out by a rain-free fortnight that it actually felt warm during the service, the Reverend David Rushton was duly collated as our new Rector after a wonderfully short vacancy (it helps when the outgoing rector becomes the bishop of the same diocese, as Bishop David pointed out in his address.) The photo shows the new rector being shown to his stall, so I'm very tempted to say he was installed in the service, but apparently this is a technical matter on which I am not entirely clear.

No blow-by-blow account, you'll be glad to read, but an impression - an impression of a full church, with people from the local area and much further afield as well as our own congregation; of lusty hymn-singing; of laughter as well as seriousness; of new friends and old - especially for us, as our friends Alastair - who has sung with me and Himself since university days - and Jane - a former pupil from Himself's early days in Dunoon who now sings in our choir - joined us to sing a communion anthem. (If ye love me, by Tallis). The bishop's sermon was built on the idea of a dance, for which our new rector would be providing the music as we learned to dance with God together, and I loved it - especially as Himself's closing voluntary was a 16th century Scottish dance.

By this time it was evening, and the crowd reassembled in St Mun's RC church hall for an epic buffet supplied by the marvellous local catering team who own my fave restaurant, Chatters. There was wine, and I ate at least two pansies (or were they violas?). The noise was awesome - at the high point I could barely hear myself speak. And it was 9pm by the time we staggered out into the moonlight.

There will be time for quiet reflection, time for gratitude for all that has happened. But for now, enough.