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John Wilkins, former editor of The Tablet, has died aged 85. He joined the paper as assistant editor in 1967, before leaving to work as a BBC producer, and returned as editor in 1982 shortly after the pastoral visit of St John Paul II.  He retired with the Christmas issue in 2003, after 21 years which saw circulation almost tripled.Born 20 December 1936, Wilkins was a scholar at Clifton College and Clare College, Cambridge, and did National Service in the Gloucestershire Regiment. He began his career at the ecumenical journal Frontier.