Fr. Frank Majka, SJ – The Bridge

Letting It Be

Jesus once told a story about over-eager field workers. Sometimes called the parable of the wheat and the weeds, the gist of it is that the workers find that someone has sown weeds in their master’s wheat field, and they ask if they should go pull them up. Surprisingly, the master tells them no. Just let them grow together, he tells them, because otherwise they risk tearing up the wheat as well.

If, like all the parables, the story is meant to relate to our lives, what’s its message? Is it that we should give up trying to make a flawless self, a perfect spouse, a perfect child, a perfect church or a perfect country?

Actually, I think that is the point. Jesus pretty clearly seems to be telling us to drop the burden of trying to right every wrong, iron out every wrinkle, and tie up every loose end. We can certainly try to improve things, but we’ll never succeed in sorting out all the good from the bad and getting rid of the bad. That will only come at the end.

In the meantime, the story warns us against too aggressively trying to eliminate all the weeds in ourselves or the world because we might ultimately do more harm than good.