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Just interested to know what character trait ye guys would look for most in a future wife assuming that she is already a “good Catholic”.
Hey Dublingirl,
Top marks for the question; it really is a fascinating one. Assuming, as you do, that she is a good Catholic, I think a man looks for a fulfilled and flourishing woman as his wife. That means that she is, or is in the process of becoming, the person that God means her to be. If this is so, then she will be naturally filled with an inner beauty and a radiance that is just so attractive to men and more importantly to the man she will eventually marry. [Cf. the book of Genesis. We can detect the sense of wonder which Adam experiences when he sees Eve for the first time: the wonder of woman; similar yet different, illustrating the beauty of the complementarity of the sexes.]
In regards to the other things you mentioned (housework vs. caring) I think it depends on the individual. (I question here whether being good at housework is a character trait at all, though admittedly it can and does point out to certain characteristics applicable to both sexes – unselfish, willing to help etc.,) Marriage is person specific – only the right person will do. And since individual tastes are quite distinct on such matters, it will naturally depend on the complementarity of the two individuals in question. The well-known phrase, “as God made them, He matched them” may sound a little trite, but it does contain a lot of sense.
The question of looks (yes, I am well aware that looks are not a character trait at all, but since the issue was raised in subsequent threads, I think it is worthwhile discussing) is again subjective, not to mention contentious. I think perhaps the argument on looks/beauty is slightly more nuanced than typified by the two extremes: firstly, where looks/beauty are the most important thing a man looks for in a wife: secondly, where looks are nothing or not important at all. Both statements are disingenuous and jejune in different ways. The first statement is indubitably much more frequently expressed outside a forum such as this. A woman is obviously so much more than her looks. She is first of all a person, a unique and special individual; a child of God and should be cherished as such. It is undeniably true though, that looks do play a more important role in general for a woman than they do for a man. But a man who merely marries for looks is a foolish man and runs a huge risk, though it is a common enough event running throughout history. The results are all too familiar, though happily not prescriptive to all such marriages; the trophy wife, the unhappiness of one or both the spouses, unfaithfulness and/or divorce.
The second statement seems perhaps initially more quixotic than the first, but does not stand up to closer scrutiny. For man (and particularly, though not exclusively, for man) the look/gaze is normally the first sense involved in the beginning of a relationship. This of course does not imply that women should merely be viewed as objects for male pleasure. Again such a notion fails miserably to take into account the beauty of woman as a person. In fact, in marriage both partners should view each other as another “I” so that, by dying to oneself, each finds oneself in the other and the two truly do become one flesh. However, to return to the main argument, no one chooses his girlfriend/wife wearing a blindfold. To use a metaphor recurrent in medieval literature, sight is the doorway which allows one access to the garden of the rose. [Again cf. Adam in the garden of Eden: before he says anything or hears Eve talk, he looks (or gazes) at her.] Women (and no disrespect intended) are more the looked-at-sex. And since they are the looked-at-sex, they like to look well; this explains why fashion magazines and modelling in general is predominantly a woman’s thing. A woman wants to look good not only in front of men but also in front of other women. It is an essential trait of her femininity. Beauty, in all its different forms, is a reflection of the divine beauty which is what we all are aiming for.
What I think the second group of men who claim that “looks do not matter” (which in any event is hardly very flattering in its implication for their girlfriends or their wives) mean to say that their gf/wife is beautiful to them, though not perhaps in what is dubiously purported to be the conventional way. (e.g. Model thinness, blonde hair, blue eyes etc, etc…yawn!) If that is what they mean, and I firmly suspect that is what they DO mean, then I take my hat off to them.
If and when I do marry, I know I will tell my future wife with perfect truth that she is the most beautiful woman in the entire world. Why? Simply because for me she always will be.
! We need a few more people this side of the Atlantic to even out the numbers! 
, – Yeah we do seem to be in the minority, but still at least minorities can become majorities, majorities can only become minorities 
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