Earlier this year, I wrote a post entitled “God … calls people to die” about a conversation I had with an old friend, but in the aftermath of my choice, I realised too late that I’d oversimplified the matter. The straightforward interpretation—that God calls us to die, to let go of the things we don’t want to let go of, to do the things we don’t want to do—can’t be universally applied. So, the phrase, based on my own experience, has left what you might call a bad taste in my mouth. Still, while my application was flawed, I still think there is something to it. God has, after all, called some people to martyrdom. Not everything that God has asked people to do has been pleasant. But not everything has been unpleasant either, and so I’ve asked myself how I would understand this statement now given the benefit of hindsight.

The answer came to me in a gospel reading from the other week. On Sunday, August 13, 2023, Catholics around the world heard the following:

[E]arly in the morning [Jesus] came walking towards them on the lake. But when the disciples saw him walking on the lake, they were terrified, saying, ‘It is a ghost!’ And they cried out in fear. But immediately Jesus spoke to them and said, ‘Take heart, it is I; do not be afraid.’

Peter answered him, ‘Lord, if it is you, command me to come to you on the water.’ He said, ‘Come.’ So Peter got out of the boat, started walking on the water, and came towards Jesus. But when he noticed the strong wind, he became frightened, and beginning to sink, he cried out, ‘Lord, save me!’ Jesus immediately reached out his hand and caught him, saying to him, ‘You of little faith, why did you doubt?’

Matthew 14:25–31

Hearing this passage, I sensed two emotions at play: desire and fear. Desire to go to the Lord is what compels Peter to step out onto the water, and it is only when he begins to fear the strong wind that he begins to sink. Fear, it would seem, is what keeps him from pursuing that desire. Just the other day, in fact, as I was on a fishing boat myself, I contemplated how fearful such a demand would make me. I’d have lost my cool as well. It’s no surprise, then, that upon being rescued, Jesus interrogates him, asking, “Why did you doubt?”

An old co-worker of mine once remarked that her favourite Apostle is Peter because “he’s so human.” She was quite right. In this particular case, I can’t help but sense that there’s something of Peter in all of us. Life, I’ve learned, comes with a lot of turbulence, and that can be frightening. It’s easy to get caught up in doubt, worrying about every little thing and how it will play out, and this can cause us, like Peter, to panic, and ultimately manifest the very eventuality we were dreading. In our fear, though natural, we can become our own worst enemies. Perhaps this is why Jesus also tells us, “Do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, or about your body, what you will wear.” (Matthew 6:25) Fear can imprison us, and keep us from even our strongest desires, as it did for Peter on a number of occassions.

What does any of this mean in the context of the original statement: “God calls people to die”? Although it’s provocative and perhaps overly simplistic, I have come to understand it more as God calling us to be fearless. Of course, we are called to far more than that: God also wants us to be fearless in the pursuit of the good, but as this is an essay of personal reflection more than apologetics, I will spare you my opinion of what “the good” is. For now, suffice it to say that the good is that at which ultimately all activities aim, but this is not my point. Rather, just as it is important to pursue the good, it is equally important to “take heart” and not be frightened by the strong wind. It’s what God calls you to.