A Fisherman At Sea

It’s the same in every age. There’s a select few who are truly faithful, regardless of what they believe; there are others who are casually faithful; some who blatantly fake it for personal benefit. But most of us don’t believe anything. We cling to some ideas in ways that are a lot like faith, but our faith is mostly in mundane everyday life.

In my day, there’s great pressure to pay homage to repackaged Greek gods (let’s face it). And there are the Jews, and there are Christians. Those are the ones that most baffle me, the Christians. They’ve been around a few years, a few decades maybe. Their origins are a little obscure. I’m told their founder died an enemy of the state. Not sure what his name was. Probably not important. I’m told in Rome they murder Christians for entertainment, and some of them, the truly fanatical ones, actually seem to welcome it! Martyrs, they call themselves.

Well, it’s a lot of nonsense, if you ask me.

I’m a fisherman by trade. My father was, and his father before him, and so on. I live and die by the fortunes of the sea. There’s a god for that. There’s a god for everything, I suppose. I mostly tend to keep to myself. Sometimes I need a little help, and sometimes I give a little help to others.  Today I needed some help. There’s a guy I’ve known tangentially for ages, always keeps to himself, sort of like me, when he isn’t gone for weeks at a time. Bad fisherman, I say.

So anyway, this guy helps me out, silent the whole time. By the time he’s finished, I ask him what he does, when he’s away. At first he remains silent. Painfully shy, I’m thinking. And maybe so. He asks me, after a while, how much I know about what happened a few years back. I say he’ll have to be more specific! He says, your father would know. I say, my father might have, but never talked about it. He says, your father worked on the sea with my father, and they weren’t anymore friends than we are.

Okay, I say. That’s impressive. Now, ask me why, he says. Sure, okay, I say. Why? Because of what happened a few years ago, he says. Now you’re talking in riddles, I say. It would be appropriate, he says. The stories his father used to tell him, they were all about riddles.  Riddles about a man who lived a few years ago, about humanity in general.

Okay, I say. Wait, is this about religion? I don’t need any, my friend. This is not about religion, he says. It’s about humanity. It’s about believing in humanity, about living in fear but having hope. But yes, it is about religion, about faith.

Wait a minute, I say. I’ve heard stories, too. Stories about your father, stories about his friends. People said they were crazy. Maybe, he says. People say they made it all up, I say, that none of it ever even happened. Just a lot of fairytales, with a nightmare ending. And yet here I am, he says. Here you are, I say, beginning to sound crazy, like your father and his friends. Maybe so, he says. Maybe none of it is true. Maybe they were fools, and I’m a fool, too. I’m just a fisherman.

But today I read something. It talked about all that nonsense, and the writer wasn’t defending himself or his faith, but encouraging others. I confess, it didn’t say anything meaningful about what happened a few years ago. Maybe the writer doesn’t believe it anymore than you do. But the thing is, he’s a Roman, who rejected all his privilege to talk about these things, to encourage others. I’m told he once thought as you did. As I do, if I’m being honest.

What? I say. I have doubts, he says. Of course I do. I’m just a simple fisherman. Like you, I’ve been doing this all my life, just as my father did, and his father before him. I see little difference, except how I view the world. Now, I see hope. Not because I was promised some great reward, but because...I guess because I can forgive others, and maybe myself, a little better than before. I don’t know. It’s not easy to talk about.

Fine, I say. Whatever.

The rest of the day I’ve been thinking about it. I’ve heard so much. A lot of conflicting things, competing things. I never took any of it seriously. I didn’t see why it was relevant, leading a life that would be the same, one way or the other, same as anyone else. But that man...

He bothers me. He made me think, not in some philosophical manner. Or maybe so. He asks so much. He wants me to rethink everything. And of course it’s absurd. Of course it is. But. It also makes sense. When he talked about how it affected him, it didn’t sound stupid at all. It sounded reasonable.

I almost hate the man. I resent him. I wish today had never happened. I could have lived the rest of my life as I had before. But I can’t.

I...believe.

I believe. I believe.

I believe.

And it changes everything.

I believe.