On Sunday, as part of St. Martin's yearlong birthday party, the spiritual menu went heavy on the fish.

The first reading featured Jonah, he of the whale. The gospel lineup included Simon Peter and brother Andrew, abandoning their nets along the Sea of Galilee to follow another fisherman.

Finally, there was Katharine Jefferts Schori. In an earlier life, she was a Stanford University-trained oceanographer. Since 2006, she has been the presiding bishop and primate of the Episcopal Church. On Sunday, she was guest celebrant at a packed St. Martin's, and the fish metaphor swam through the entirety of her sermon.

Climb in the right boat when choosing a life's path, she told the congregation. Cast your net often for the betterment of the community, lest that connection for a greater good dries up and breaks apart.

"Your net is still catching fish because it reaches out into the community with invitation, not compulsion," she said. "This net is a living organism. ... Your task is to keep it wet and alive."

Schori presides over Episcopalians in 16 countries. She made her first visit to North Carolina, in part, to help St. Martin's celebrate its 125th anniversary, a century of it spent in the small building tucked between Seventh Street and Independence Park.

As Schori noted often in her sermon, St. Martin's has a long tradition of community involvement. It was home to the city's first Boys and Girls Scout troops. Today, its 750 members are active participants in a host of community affairs, from AIDS and HIV awareness to homelessness and affordable housing.

As part of its anniversary celebration, St. Martin's also has raised more than $500,000 for "Fellowship Courtyard," which will give the church and community a park at the St. Martin's entrance while improving drainage along Seventh.

The Rev. Murdoch Smith, the seventh rector in the church's history, likes to point out that St. Martin's is an "intentional" spiritual community, a "town church" that draws worshippers from some 20 ZIP codes around the city.

Sunday, so many wanted to hear Schori that the church had to reserve seats.

Decked out in her multi-colored robes, the bishop served as exclamation point for a 40-person procession that entered and departed through a vaulted ceiling of song.

In the middle of the ceremony, Smith presented Schori with a traditional St. Martin's gift, a purple "prayer shawl" that contained the congregation's spiritual best wishes for her continued work.

Metaphorically speaking, Schori didn't miss a beat.

"Looks like a purple fishing net to me," she said, first to laughter, then a burst of applause.