Reflection This Week
GONE FISHING

   There are those, many, no doubt, who would assert that that I have missed out on one of the truly great joys of life because I have never gone fishing. Never. Further, doing so is not on my list of ten things I want to do sometime. It would not be on my list were it ten times as long. My Dad never fished. The guys I grew up with never fished – or skied or hunted. We were satisfied to play ball, any kind of ball game, all year long.

   Nevertheless, I have spent almost all of my adult life fishing, in Jesus’ terms to Peter, Andrew, James and John, fishing for people. Well, that’s not quite true. I have spent my adult life sending you out to go fishing and then I wait for you, the true fishermen and women, to bring the fish you have caught back to me. Yes, there are some clergy who do go fishing: they go from door to door evangelizing. Some use the media. Most of us, however, deal with the fish once they are caught and landed, or at least once they are on the line.

   To stay with the metaphor, fish do not come to the fishers. The fishers, you, have to go after them. You have to go where they are. Further, once you are where they are, they may not take the bait you throw out to them. If it is tempting, pleasing, alluring enough, they will. If not, they will not. Once they have latched on to the bait, you have to reel them in. It will always be a struggle because no one likes to get caught; no one likes to venture into the unknown, be taken to one knows not where. The fisherman has to be more determined to catch the fish than the fish are to be caught.

   Fishing for people is the role of the laity. Preparing the laity to go fishing is the role of the clergy, the role of the church. The clergy alone, of course, do not fill that role. Perhaps they once did but not any more. The laity come to church, to this place, to learn how to fish, to receive the equipment necessary to do so. There they receive the support of their fellow fishers and are given strength through the sacraments.

   The truth is every Christian, every time s/he leaves home, could place a sign on the door that reads, “Gone Fishing”. Every time each one of us, laity and clergy alike, step out into the world, what we are doing, whether we realize it or not, is going fishing. By the way we live our lives, by the way we love, work and play, we are casting a line trying to catch those who have not been caught, who have not found what we have found, have not found Jesus.

   The great part in all this is that we do not need any equipment: no rod and reel, or line or net, no boat or waders: nothing. To be the fishers Jesus calls us to be we just need to be ourselves, using whatever gifts and talents with which we have been blessed, and seeing and seeking and serving the Jesus we see in every person we meet. Whatever we are doing, wherever we are, we are fishing.

   How successful we are is not the point. The number of fish we catch is not important. We have to leave that in God’s hands allowing the Spirit to do the pushing and prodding. The laity, you, are the fishers as well as the line, the bait and the hook. When the fish see the Jesus in you seeing the Jesus in them, they’re ripe for the catch. Reel them in. It may or may not be a struggle. But don’t give up. Then bring them to church and together we will teach them, too, how to fish.     WJP