A Reflection for Thursday of the Twenty-second Week in Ordinary Time
“Master, we have worked hard all night and have caught nothing,
but at your command I will lower the nets.” (Lk 5:5)
Something I’ve learned from living by the ocean: Fishing boats go out at night. At midnight I often see tiny lights bobbing on the horizon, people out earning a living as I am going to bed. But in all the times I’ve read today’s Gospel, I’ve never grasped what Peter actually says to Jesus: “Master, we have worked hard all night.” Fishermen fish at night.
And these fishermen have had a bad night. They caught nothing. They’re washing their nets. They’re discouraged. They’re done. They must have thought this non-fisherman Jesus a fool for telling them to put out to deep water and lower their nets in broad daylight. Why does Peter even agree to do as Jesus says? Peter, wise in the ways of fishing, knows better. But he obliges the teacher.
Then the miracle happens, so overwhelmingly that the huge unexpected catch starts to tear their nets. Their boats are so full of fish that they might sink. It is a vivid validation of placing one’s faith in the fool who is actually wise. Which is one lesson from today’s readings.
The world offers the ephemeral; God offers us what lasts, which is to belong to God only.
The chorus of “My Back Pages,” an old Bob Dylan song, springs to my mind: “Ah, but I was so much older then; I’m younger than that now.” When I was a teenager listening to these lyrics, I thought Bob was just being, you know, deep or something. Now that I am so much older, I am astonished at the young Dylan’s keen perception. We are so certain of our wisdom when we are starting out on the path of adulthood. It takes a lifetime of living to see that the wisdom we thought we possessed was foolhardy, that we have sometimes gained wisdom only through a willingness to appear foolish. As St. Paul teaches us, what passes for worldly wisdom is foolish in the eyes of God, and vice versa. It just takes us a good long while to learn this. The world offers the ephemeral; God offers us what lasts, which is to belong to God only.
The end of the Gospel story is even more astonishing than the miraculous catch: These fishermen leave behind their livelihoods—they leaveeverything, we’re told—to follow a man they’ve just met. And they do so without a second thought. Without a backward glance. Without fear. In the eyes of the world, this is foolishness. Folly! Madness!
And we are called to do likewise, to let go of our boatloads of stuff and traipse after Jesus, to put ourselves out into deep water and be tiny lights bobbing on the horizon of faith. Come after me, says the Lord. We have work to do. Become fools. Become wise.
