FROM THE EDITORS July 4, 2005 Issue

DROPPING OUR NETS

ONE CAN IMAGINE THE SCENE: Late afternoon, perhaps, the Sea of Galilee spreading out from the shore, an enormous apron of azure blue against a deepening pearlescent sky. Two men on the shoreline, brothers, converse quietly, intent on casting their fishing nets. A man approaches. Whatever he says to them inspires them to the point that the brothers, Peter and Andrew, simply drop their nets, their hearts on fire with a passion to follow this man, even to a new world.

Lifting their gaze beyond the world they inhabit, they walk away from everything familiar to set off with Jesus of Nazareth on an entirely new path. As they proceed, they come upon more fishermen. The Bible recounts the next part of the story: "And going on from thence, he [Jesus] saw other two brethren, James the son of Zebedee, and John his brother, in a ship with Zebedee their father, mending their nets; and he called them. And they immediately left the ship and their father, and followed him" (Matt. 4:21, 22).

Jesus called these men to a life of ministry. And they did not resist. Leaving the comfort of their livelihoods, their families, and home villages, they ventured forth with no plan, no means of support, equipped only with their commitment to transform the world through love. In a hymn that expresses his desire to be likewise led, the 19th-century poet John Greenleaf Whittier wrote:

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