Fishers of Men: Being Christ's Body

What does it mean to be a fisher of men?

The Gospel today contains what should be to us a famous passage, “Do not be afraid. From now on you will catch men.” In the parallel tellings of the the account in the Gospels of Matthew and Mark, it has the more well-known version, “Follow me and I will make you fishers of men.” Does our Lord use this language in order to simply play on the fact that many of the twelve apostles, as the ones He calls here, are already fishermen? Or is there something deeper?

For the ancient world, water had a very deep, if you’ll forgive the pun, meaning. Water, as it was created, was a source of life and a source of cleansing. Yet, in the fallen world, water was the realm of chaos. It was dangerous, unpredictable, as easily a source of death as of life. It was associated with the underworld, and was the realm of demons. Throughout Scripture, we can see the association of water as a realm of death. When we listen to the hymns at Theophany or at the baptismal service, this theme is brought out explicitly. This brings a new meaning to the idea of being fishers of men.

For a fish, whose home is in the water, to be caught by a fisherman is not a good thing. It leads to almost certain death. For us, however, to whom the waters are a realm of chaos and death, to be fished out is to be brought out of that realm and into the opportunity for life. When Christ makes the Apostles to be Fishers of Men, He bestows on them the ministry of drawing men and women into His net so that they can be brought from under the dominion of chaos that is the waters.

Far from being a matter of death, this brings us into the realm of life - the Church.