Ephesians 5:22....revisited

[severus68]

I know enough to distinguish between equality of dignity and equality of role – want to give it a stab, Severus? It won’t hurt you I promise. Or do you think equality of dignity = equality of role?

I am always happy to discuss with anyone who really discusses/debates without rancour.

 

[severus68]

Just a humble, uneducated, non-theologian here… I haven’t read all the posts so forgive me if I’m repeating a point of view all ready presented. The way I view this: Stephen Harper is our prime minister (Yes, your friendly neighbour to the north) but he makes no decisions on his own. He consults and discusses and takes into consideration points brought forth from the cabinet. And the important decisions are always voted on. We should view marriage like a government… Though the husband may be the head of the household, he should always consult with his wife and take her feelings and opinions into careful consideration before making the important decisions. A good husband would afford his wife the opportunity to be heard and a good wife will be submissive to her husband (within reason…excluding abuse and such). Your MOST IMPORTANT goal in marriage is to make YOUR SPOUSE happy. And a good spouse should recognize if what makes them happy, makes their spouse miserable, some sacrifice may be in order. It’s all give and take, whether you’re the head or the backbone of the marriage!

just my two cents

With respect, marriage is not like government or the military (not said by you,. Marriage should be about love and respect, not power and control. Respect, sacrifice should be a two way street.

 

[CroCatholic]

With respect, marriage is not like government or the military (not said by you,. Marriage should be about love and respect, not power and control. Respect, sacrifice should be a two way street.

You obviously failed to read my post in it’s entirety…

 

[severus68]

You obviously failed to read my post in it’s entirety…

I did. If you are referring to the last part of your post, I do not see how it can be a to way street when the wife is not an equal partner in the marriage.

 

[CroCatholic]

Who said she’s not equal? Just curious (feel free not to answer) are you married?

You’re totally missing the point… The first and most important duty for any married couple is to put the happiness and well being of their spouse above their own. Mutual sacrifice. My sacrifice to my husband is to be submissive to him (among other things). His (major) sacrifice to me is working like a dog so that I can stay home with our children (among many other things). Different, but equal.

We both sacrifice in different ways. I give him authority over me, He doesn’t take it. He can’t have authority over me unless I give it. It’s MY choice. Just like Jesus doesn’t barge into your life and force you to believe, attend Mass, pray etc. He gave you the rules, but he doesn’t make you play by them. That part is up to you.

 

[Dan_Daly]

Dan Daly will tell you himself about his views which include:

1. A woman remains under the authority of her father until she leaves to be under the authority of her husband;
2. Higher education is not necessary especially for women.

Dan’s views are not necessarily the views of even those who have supported the position that the husband is the head of the family.

With charity, please allow me to answer questions that were posed directly to me.

As for my example of which city to live:

I stated, that if a common agreement could not be reached the wife should submit to the husband’s decision.

This is quite different than a man just issuing orders to his wife. A loving and wise husband seeks to know and understand his wife, because if we love someone we want to know and understand them. People disagree sometimes. Even people who are loving and respectful of one another. If the couple can not agree, then a decision still has to be made. That decision is the responsiblity of the husband. While some may see it as “pulling rank”, I think a more accurate view is it is his grave responsiblity. Say the couple disagrees, and the family follows the husband’s decision to go to St. Louis…the husband is responsible for that decision for good or for ill.

Pax Christi and God Bless.

 

[LightBound]

With charity, please allow me to answer questions that were posed directly to me.

As for my example of which city to live:

I stated, that if a common agreement could not be reached the wife should submit to the husband’s decision.

This is quite different than a man just issuing orders to his wife. A loving and wise husband seeks to know and understand his wife, because if we love someone we want to know and understand them. People disagree sometimes. Even people who are loving and respectful of one another. If the couple can not agree, then a decision still has to be made. That decision is the responsiblity of the husband. While some may see it as “pulling rank”, I think a more accurate view is it is his grave responsiblity. Say the couple disagrees, and the family follows the husband’s decision to go to St. Louis…the husband is responsible for that decision for good or for ill.

Pax Christi and God Bless.

Sooooooo…wouldn’t the sacrificial aspect of the husband (giving himself up as Christ gave himself up for the Church) involve giving up his wishes to move to St Louis?

Following quote from BMullins wise post earlier in this thread:

“No man who loves his wife more than his own life will hold it over her head that he is put in charge of the final vote. He would instead cast that final vote in love for her! Or even step aside and say I love you so much, that we are going to do what you want to to do, even if it’s not what I want to do, as long as it’s God’s will.”

Interesting thought! It takes quite a man to put aside his own ego as the “head” and sacrifice his own wants and needs for his wife. That makes quite a challenge for most men to live out that particular Biblical teaching, don’t you think? Too many guys look at the “surface” of the verse, without going deep into it and understanding what it is really calling them to do for the sake of the marital harmony (if need be).

 

[Dan_Daly]

Sooooooo…wouldn’t the sacrificial aspect of the husband (giving himself up as Christ gave himself up for the Church) involve giving up his wishes to move to St Louis?

Following quote from BMullins wise post earlier in this thread:

“No man who loves his wife more than his own life will hold it over her head that he is put in charge of the final vote. He would instead cast that final vote in love for her! Or even step aside and say I love you so much, that we are going to do what you want to to do, even if it’s not what I want to do, as long as it’s God’s will.”

Interesting thought! It takes quite a man to put aside his own ego as the “head” and sacrifice his own wants and needs for his wife. That makes quite a challenge for most men to live out that particular Biblical teaching, don’t you think? Too many guys look at the “surface” of the verse, without going deep into it and understanding what it is really calling them to do for the sake of the marital harmony (if need be).

It would depend entirely on why the man wants to move to St. Louis. Is it simply what he wants? Or is it what he believes is best for his family?

Giving people what they want is not always the most loving thing to do. Sometimes, loving leadership means making the unpopular decision because it is the right decision.

The key is someone is not relieved of their obligations even if someone else fails in theirs. If a wife does not submit to her husband, the husband must still love her as Christ loves the Church. And if a husband does not love his wife, the wife must still submit to his authority. Obviously, a couple should strive to both fulfill their duties, but due to sin, we all fail at least some of the time. None of us can say “well they aren’t keeping up their part of the bargain, so I don’t have to either”.

Pax

 

[Dan_Daly]

There are very serious consequences of the positions advanced by some in this thread. Does the Church grow in understanding? Yes. But moving from “The husband is the head of the family” to “there is no head of the family” is not a growth. It is a contradiction.

Fortunately, no such contradiction exists in the teaching of the Church, nor can it. But if a person believes it exists, if they believe that the Church has taught error in the past and “grown out of it” then they do not believe in the Church established by Christ. If such a position were adopted, what prevents the Church from “growing” into a position where contraception is accepted or sodomy is placed alongside marriage as a peer. There are many mistaken people who hope for such changes to take place, but they are simply impossible.

Again from Pope Pius XI in Casti Connubii (emphasis mine):

1. Domestic society being confirmed, therefore, by this bond of love, there should flourish in it that “order of love,” as St. Augustine calls it. **This order includes both the primacy of the husband with regard to the wife and children, the ready subjection of the wife and her willing obedience, **which the Apostle commends in these words: “Let women be subject to their husbands as to the Lord, because the husband is the head of the wife, and Christ is the head of the Church.”[29]

1. This subjection, however, does not deny or take away the liberty which fully belongs to the woman both in view of her dignity as a human person, and in view of her most noble office as wife and mother and companion; nor does it bid her obey her husband’s every request if not in harmony with right reason or with the dignity due to wife; nor, in fine, does it imply that the wife should be put on a level with those persons who in law are called minors, to whom it is not customary to allow free exercise of their rights on account of their lack of mature judgment, or of their ignorance of human affairs. But it forbids that exaggerated liberty which cares not for the good of the family; it forbids that in this body which is the family, the heart be separated from the head to the great detriment of the whole body and the proximate danger of ruin. For if the man is the head, the woman is the heart, and as he occupies the chief place in ruling, so she may and ought to claim for herself the chief place in love.

1. Again, this subjection of wife to husband in its degree and manner may vary according to the different conditions of persons, place and time. In fact, if the husband neglect his duty, it falls to the wife to take his place in directing the family.** But the structure of the family and its fundamental law, established and confirmed by God, must always and everywhere be maintained intact .**

Pax Christi

 

[severus68]

Who said she’s not equal? Just curious (feel free not to answer) are you married?

You’re totally missing the point… The first and most important duty for any married couple is to put the happiness and well being of their spouse above their own. Mutual sacrifice. My sacrifice to my husband is to be submissive to him (among other things). His (major) sacrifice to me is working like a dog so that I can stay home with our children (among many other things). Different, but equal.

We both sacrifice in different ways. I give him authority over me, He doesn’t take it. He can’t have authority over me unless I give it. It’s MY choice. Just like Jesus doesn’t barge into your life and force you to believe, attend Mass, pray etc. He gave you the rules, but he doesn’t make you play by them. That part is up to you.

CAF is an anonymous forum so please understand if I choose not to share my personal details.
It is your right to decide what kind of marriage you have. To me different but equal means just that. Men and women are different yes but equality means one does not have rmore rights over the other. Both adult and women have responsibility for their own decisions. A woman can make her own decisions and act on them. This is the 21st century when women can have financial independence, drive a car etc.

 

[Dan_Daly]

Your MOST IMPORTANT goal in marriage is to make YOUR SPOUSE happy.

I must strenuously disagree with this.

Your most important goal in marriage is to get your spouse to heaven.

Ultimately, getting to heaven equates to eternal happiness, and if that is what was meant then I can agree. However, if making one’s spouse “happy” means catering to their every desire and striving first and foremost to bring them earthly pleasure, then that is definitely not what marriage or Catholicism is about.

A true marriage is fueled by passion. Our culture has that part right. It simply mistakes passion for pleasure, which it is not. Passion, as in Our Lord’s passsion, is suffering.

Embracing suffering and carrying one’s cross is the at the core of the Catholic faith and Catholic marriage.

Pax

 

[chevalier]

If a woman wants a marriage like the one you say is her perogative. It is not the marriage Christ said it must be. If the greatest commandment of love is followed, we would not want to be heads of our wives.

I don’t actually want that, at least not in the same sense I might want a promotion or raise at work or any subordinates doing what they’re asked. But a responsibility, if you have it, is a different thing, it isn’t optional and you can’t just say you don’t have it. For my own marriage, if it ever were to happen, I’d be happy to find someone who would be happy to abstain from the struggle for domination, initial or constant, that I see so often in people around me or even in my own experience, that it disheartens me on occasions.

I agree, though, that if the commandment of love were followed, or even the first part of Eph. 5:22, then there would be no question of pulling rank, putting your foot down etc. Still, even then, if each of the partners is equally convinced of the merits of his and her position (for the good of the family, not for his or her own desires) and those positions are different, then you can’t have two mutually exclusive positions at the same time. One of the positions is going to prevail. There’s a reason why boards of two members are not appointed.

At the risk of sounding cynical, the way I see it, the husband has it “worse”. The wife can pull all she wants on him to get her way, whereas he can only put his foot down when it comes to the good of family and not his own desires.

 

[chevalier]

It would depend entirely on why the man wants to move to St. Louis. Is it simply what he wants? Or is it what he believes is best for his family?

Giving people what they want is not always the most loving thing to do. Sometimes, loving leadership means making the unpopular decision because it is the right decision.

The key is someone is not relieved of their obligations even if someone else fails in theirs. If a wife does not submit to her husband, the husband must still love her as Christ loves the Church. And if a husband does not love his wife, the wife must still submit to his authority. Obviously, a couple should strive to both fulfill their duties, but due to sin, we all fail at least some of the time. None of us can say “well they aren’t keeping up their part of the bargain, so I don’t have to either”.

Pax

You quoted Pope Pius XI as saying that a request inconsisent with “right reason and dignity of the wife” (not quoting verbatim) would not be binding. Therefore you can’t say unqualifiedly that the wife is always to follow the husband’s choices. If this is a well-weighed decision to move where there is work as opposed to staying where family and friends are and hoping for work to appear out of nowhere, then yeah, I’d say she should follow him. On the other hand, if he simply found or neighbourhood a plot he likes more than the current one, then that would be against reason and possibly against the dignity of the wife, who’d be expected to follow him like a child or servant, which Pius XI specifically disclaimed. So the moving to St. Luis example is of limited use.

 

[severus68]

I

don’t actually want that, at least not in the same sense I might want a promotion or raise at work or any subordinates doing what they’re asked. But a responsibility, if you have it, is a different thing, it isn’t optional and you can’t just say you don’t have it. For my own marriage, if it ever were to happen, I’d be happy to find someone who would be happy to abstain from the struggle for domination, initial or constant, that I see so often in people around me or even in my own experience, that it disheartens me on occasions.

 

[chevalier]

chevalier;8880859:

There is responsibility on every adult, in every situation. Wouldn’t the woman also want a man who does not want to dominate.

Sigh. I don’t want to offend anyone but my experience tends to lend itself to a different conclusion. I believe it would be hard to find someone desiring to live in a partnership marriage. I suppose most people would be comfortable either dominating or being dominated but not playing on the same team and actually getting along. The very idea of me becoming a henpecked husband is laughable but at the same time I have no desire to dominate anybody and I find no joy in power trips. If I had to pick either of the two, I’d pick a third and die single. If I don’t find a woman for whom the merits of an idea will matter more than whose idea it was, I probably will die single.

If there is love, there should not be a struggle for domination, it should not a power struggle, it should not be about power at all.

Yup. The problem with that struggle for domination is a problem with capacity for love, I suppose.

Each couple has to decide how they want their marriage to be, really before they marry.

No contracts please. If I wanted to draw a general partnership agreement, I’d be starting a shop and not a marriage. And, there’s much more to marriage than whatever the parties want it to be, while I do agree that there should be a lot of talking about how each of them envisages their marriage.

Marriage is not a business. It is a loving commitment entered into before God. There should always be discussion, consulting each another and compromise when necessary with give and take.

Even in business you can sometimes skip give and take and arrive at something better. I tend to associate compromise and give and take with dividing the cake. Except you can get more business value by value creating than by value dividing. You probably only ever get an exactly equal division if you cut the existing cake in two, at 50/50. But with some additional effort, you can arrive at 60/80 or 70/90 or 75/80. And, equally in business as in marriage, people would do well to stop obsessing about whose idea gets chosen but rather start looking at which idea is substantively the better.

I do advise my clients not to have 50:50 partnerships and shareholdings. I am often told “We are friends, there will not be any problems”. Marriage is not business and I have a lot more faith in a marriage entered into with love with full awareness of what marriage entails than I have in any business venture.

The thought is important and worth spending sime time on, though I don’t have anything of value to say about it right now.

If you referring to a husband must be willing to die for his wife etc, a wife would also give her life for her husband and both would do so for their children.

Actually, I’ll stick with the idea that his obligation in that regard is bigger or more significant, as it was mentioned more specifically by the Apostle. The way I see it, you don’t get to do what you desire if you have a position of authority. For example, monarchs have had little opportunity to do just that as long as they took their duties seriously. The family head is at a worse position when it comes to having his desires met (let’s take the proverbial dispute about the colour of the curtains… he will take his duties seriously and give up for her this small piece of his life which is his subjective preferences), although he does have more leverage when it comes to decisions which actually affect the good of the family. Incidentally, when the husband is being a douchebag and the wife is the one proposing decisions that are good for the family, it is a situation like some of Dan’s quotes described, where the wife is taking over the duties the husband is failing in. This makes me think all of us here in this thread aren’t worlds apart from each other.

 

[severus68]

severus68;8880998:

No contracts please. If I wanted to draw a general partnership agreement, I’d be starting a shop and not a marriage. And, there’s much more to marriage than whatever the parties want it to be, while I do agree that there should be a lot of talking about how each of them envisages their marriage.

When people are all dewy eyed in love, they tend to forget the reality of marriage, the need to work at it. If you do not know and agree with what is of utmost importance to the other, what exactly are you promising in their vows?

Even in business you can sometimes skip give and take and arrive at something better. I tend to associate compromise and give and take with dividing the cake. Except you can get more business value by value creating than by value dividing. You probably only ever get an exactly equal division if you cut the existing cake in two, at 50/50. But with some additional effort, you can arrive at 60/80 or 70/90 or 75/80. And, equally in business as in marriage, people would do well to stop obsessing about whose idea gets chosen but rather start looking at which idea is substantively the better.

I would never compare marriage to a business contract.

Actually, I’ll stick with the idea that his obligation in that regard is bigger or moresignificant, as it was mentioned more specifically by the Apostle. The way I see it, you don’t get to do what you desire if you have a position of authority. For example, monarchs have had little opportunity to do just that as long as they took their duties seriously. The family head is at a worse position when it comes to having his desires met (let’s take the proverbial dispute about the colour of the curtains… he will take his duties seriously and give up for her this small piece of his life which is his subjective preferences), although he does have more leverage when it comes to decisions which actually affect the good of the family. Incidentally, when the husband is being a douchebag and the wife is the one proposing decisions that are good for the family, it is a situation like some of Dan’s quotes described, where the wife is taking over the duties the husband is failing in. This makes me think all of us here in this thread aren’t worlds apart from each other.

Kings were created out of a need for protection by the strongest. They did what they needed to do to retain their power. They and some of their people may have thought they had the divine right to be king which enabled them to retain the loyalty of the people.
It may have been necessary to have such power to maintain peace then. Surely that can never apply to a marriage.
The colour of the curtains? What largess!

 

[chevalier]

chevalier;8881341:

Kings were created out of a need for protection by the strongest. They did what they needed to do to retain their power. They and some of their people may have thought they had the divine right to be king which enabled them to retain the loyalty of the people.
It may have been necessary to have such power to maintain peace then. Surely that can never apply to a marriage.
The colour of the curtains? What largess!

I’m afraid you didn’t understand. Try not to focus on discrediting the details but seeing the logic behind the examples, please?

Responsibility for someone means your own desires and wishes take a backseat if they aren’t altogether ignored. This all the while those under your care will make a lot of requests which are mostly aimed at short-term satisfaction or asserting themselves.

Curtains were the example of a decision that doesn’t have a moral dimension or a good of family dimension but comes down to what each of the spouses subjectively prefers, thus a clear example of competing desires.

 

[Dan_Daly]

You quoted Pope Pius XI as saying that a request inconsisent with “right reason and dignity of the wife” (not quoting verbatim) would not be binding. Therefore you can’t say unqualifiedly that the wife is always to follow the husband’s choices. If this is a well-weighed decision to move where there is work as opposed to staying where family and friends are and hoping for work to appear out of nowhere, then yeah, I’d say she should follow him. On the other hand, if he simply found or neighbourhood a plot he likes more than the current one, then that would be against reason and possibly against the dignity of the wife, who’d be expected to follow him like a child or servant, which Pius XI specifically disclaimed. So the moving to St. Luis example is of limited use.

Greetings Chevalier,

If you read back over my posts, you will find that I’ve never claimed a wife must unqualifiedly follow her husband’s choices. There is never an authority that can require obedience to sin. I would also hesitate to use Pius XI as the sole standard on the issue. Just as with John Paul II, he must be examined in continuity and context with the rest of Church teaching.

Pax Christi and God bless.

 

[severus68]

severus68;8881536:

I’m afraid you didn’t understand. Try not to focus on discrediting the details but seeing the logic behind the examples, please?

Thank you but I quite understand. What I was trying to say about your example of monarchs with real powers is that they were necessary for awhile and often a necessary evil.Today the only non constitutional monarchs except for one, are tyrants. In either case, there is no taking the burden of great responsibility while taking care of the wants of others which you liken to the so called position of a husband as the ‘head’ of the family.
Whichever you look at it, the wife is less than the husband even if mot quite in the position of a child.

Curtains were the example of a decision that doesn’t have a moral dimension or a good of family dimension but comes down to what each of the spouses subjectively prefers, thus a clear example of competing desires.

Basically you said, the husband can give in to his wife on the small things while the decisions on the big issues remain with. You said "he will take his duties seriously and give up for her this small piece of his life which is his subjective preferences), although he does have more leverage when it comes to decisions which actually affect the good of the family.

 

[CroCatholic]

I must strenuously disagree with this.

Your most important goal in marriage is to get your spouse to heaven.

Ultimately, getting to heaven equates to eternal happiness, and if that is what was meant then I can agree. However, if making one’s spouse “happy” means catering to their every desire and striving first and foremost to bring them earthly pleasure, then that is definitely not what marriage or Catholicism is about.

A true marriage is fueled by passion. Our culture has that part right. It simply mistakes passion for pleasure, which it is not. Passion, as in Our Lord’s passsion, is suffering.

Embracing suffering and carrying one’s cross is the at the core of the Catholic faith and Catholic marriage.

Pax

You’re 100% correct… And I agree totally.