When I was a kid my
Grandma Gallo taught me a card game called “Go Fish.” You may be familiar with it; it’s a simple game
where each player is dealt 5 cards and you take turns asking the other players
for a card that matches one in your hand.
The object is to collect the most matches. If your opponent has the card you ask for,
she gives it to you. If she doesn't have
it she says, “Go Fish,” and you have to pick up another card from the
deck. If you’re lucky, you pick up a
matching card and get another turn. “Go
Fish” takes on a completely different meaning in today’s Gospel, and luck has
nothing to do with it.
Today’s Gospel presents
an unusual scene. Following the miracle
of the empty tomb and after the resurrected Jesus appeared to the Apostles twice
out of nowhere, walking through walls and disappearing in an instant, the
Apostles decide to go fishing. Somehow
that doesn't seem like an appropriate response to me. But we have to remember that John’s Gospel is
highly symbolic, and “[b]y the time this Gospel was written, the use of the
image of fishing for the pastoral ministry of the Church was common.”[1] So symbolically, we find the Apostles trying
to fulfill Jesus’ promise that he would make them fishers of men. But without Jesus, they didn't catch anything.
You see, when Jesus was
with them, when they walked with him and talked with him and shared meals with
him, “their hearts burned within them.”
But now he was gone, or so they thought, and they “lost that loving
feeling,” as the song goes. They lost
their enthusiasm for the mission entrusted to them. So they weren't very good fishers of
men. But as soon as they hear his voice
and listen to him, they’re wildly successful and their Spirit-filled enthusiasm
inspired by love returns. “The enormous
catch . . . represents the universal mission of the Church carried out by those
who without Jesus can do nothing but who will be fruitful as long as they abide
in him and obey him,”[2]
as long as they love him.
Jesus makes it perfectly
clear that loving him is the key to the ministry of the Church. Toward the end of the Gospel, Jesus
interrogates Peter three times with the same question, “Do you love me?” And only after he receives a positive
response does Jesus charge Peter with his mission: “Feed my lambs; tend my sheep; feed my
sheep.” Peter can’t be a successful
shepherd, or a fisher of men, for that matter, if he doesn't love Jesus first.
We’re all
called to be fishers of men, just like the Apostles. Through our common Baptism, fed by Christ in
the Eucharist and sealed with the Gift of the Holy Spirit in Confirmation, we
become “obliged to spread the faith by word and deed.”[3] But we’ll be no more successful at it than
the Apostles were at the beginning of the Gospel if we’re not in relationship
with Christ; if we don’t love him first.
We can study the Bible and the
Catechism all year, we can hear his Word and consume his Body and Blood every
Sunday, but if we don’t love Jesus, we’re just going through the motions. And we certainly won’t convince anyone to join
us, we won’t catch any fish, by just going through the motions. “Hey, do you want to just go through the
motions with us this Sunday?” That
sounds kind of silly to me. And, as the great
philosopher Steven Wright once said, “There’s a fine line between fishing and
standing on the shore like an idiot.”
In our context, that
fine line is love. If we love Jesus, if
we feed his lambs and tend his sheep, we’ll experience the most gratifying life
we can live. And the joy and enthusiasm
that come with being in a loving relationship with Jesus is the best bait out
there. The fish will jump right into our
boat. Just look at Pope Francis. The Holy Father loves Jesus – no one would
doubt how he’d answer Jesus’ three questions.
We all know he loves Jesus because
we can see it when he washes the feet of prisoners; when he stops his car to
embrace a child crippled by cerebral palsy; when he encourages every member of the
Church he leads to bring Jesus to the poorest of the poor. And guess what, Church attendance around the
world has gone up since his election.
People see the joy he gets out of his ministry; they feel Christ’s love
flowing right through him and they say, “I gotta get me some of that!” Pope Francis’ success as a fisher of men doesn't come from luck; it comes from love.
Of course, fishing can
be messy business. You have to get your
hands dirty, and you may even end up smelling like fish. But as the Spanish proverb says, “You can’t
catch a trout with dry breeches.” And I
can tell you from my own experience that it’s well worth it. When Jesus caught me hook, line and sinker, I
was filled with a joy and enthusiasm that I couldn't keep in. I had to share his love. I had to go fishing. Some of you may be wishing that Jesus had
thrown me back, but Jesus must have thought I was a keeper. I love my ministry because I love the one who
gave it to me, and I love the people he asked me to serve. You’re not always pretty . . . I mean
ministry’s not always pretty – I've done a lot of things in ministry that I
never would have imagined I would do – but the rewards are out of this
world.
I know that this
congregation is filled with people who love Jesus. I see it all the time. I see it especially today in the five
candidates who will receive the Sacrament of Confirmation this morning. I've been blessed with the opportunity to watch
your love of Jesus grow during this past year.
You took your formation very seriously; it wasn't a game to you. And if I can give you just two more pieces of
advice for a joy-filled life, they would be:
“Love Jesus;” and then “Go
Fish!”
No comments:
Post a Comment
God is listening . . . comment accordingly.