This past week I was walking through Coho Park and saw salmon fry flitting across sunbeams in the stream.
What an amazing sight.
As I contemplated the salmon, I thought, is there any better symbol of the resurrection than this? Is there a better Easter sermon than their story, the story of these amazing fish, who swim up rivers and streams to die? Through their deaths they bring new life, not only to the next generation of salmon, but also by nourishing, with their very bodies, countless animals, and even the trees of the forests themselves, which surround their spawning streams.
As we introduce the common cup back into our Sunday morning services during the Season of Creation, the salmon also gave me some insight, I think, on the nature of the Church as a Eucharistic community.
As I looked down at these little fish, swimming in sunbeams, my prayer became that like the salmon, who by their life and death, nourish an entire forest, that the Communion we partake in – communion with God and with each other – may be the food that through us, goes on to nourish the entire world.
Thanks be to God!
CG+