I was on a bit of a tight schedule one day, so on my way from one hospital to another, I stopped off for lunch at a fast food restaurant, whose name I will not mention. After I got my Chicken McNuggets, I went over to do battle with the paper napkin dispenser. [What mean-minded person invented those things, anyway?] While I was engaged in mortal combat with this stainless steel contraption that parts with napkins as willingly as a mother bear parts with her cubs, and with just about the same amount of shredding and clawing, my concentration was broken by a too-loud voice from behind me.

"You're a preacher, aren't you?" asked the voice. "Does it show that much?" I winced, as I smiled at the kindly-looking woman who made the inquiry, and whom I did not recognize. I wasn't wearing a clerical…