What exactly does this whole submission to the husband thing mean?

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Did you read it in its entirety?
I read the quote you provided.

In case I wasn’t clear, one of the reasons that there’s so much pushback against wifely submission is that many of the versions of it that have been advanced are imprudent and unworkable and also do not mesh well with the plain sense of Casti Connubii.
 
Clearing it with his wife first? Unreal. The wife is his Boss now? Lol.
Moving a family overseas is a big deal, and yes, all major decisions that a couple makes should ideally be greenlighted by both members of the couple. Barring weird/tragic circumstances, neither spouse should be out there Lone Rangering it with regard to major decisions: quitting jobs, taking jobs, borrowing money, long distance moves, budgeting, car purchase, overnight guests/longterm guests, family travel, in-law management, choosing a rental or home to purchase, children’s schooling, children’s religious education, family schedule, choice of parish, retirement savings, etc.

On reflection, I’d also like to add that I’d forgotten some of the expenses and difficulties involved with the overseas move we were discussing earlier: finding a substitute renter or paying the rent on a rental you’re not living in, selling a house or setting up with a property management company to take care of maintenance and tenant issues, selling cars, shipping stuff overseas or buying new stuff in the new area, etc.

The more I think about it, the bigger a financial nightmare it sounds like, and the less reasonable it sounds to move a family overseas with one month notice. And again, most school age kids would freak out at the idea. We moved our kids to TX from DC when our oldest was almost 5, and it took her over a year before she stopped going on and on about how terrible it was that we had taken her out of her old school…It was hard enough dealing with that when both my husband and I were enthusiastic about our move and economically we really had no choice, but if the mom deep down felt the same way? Ay yay yay!

Another thing I have to add about the overseas move is that a couple really ought to plan to do a check-in at some point (perhaps a year in) to see if the new location is working for them and the kids and consider going back home if it’s not. But in order to do that, you have to have the funds available to afford going back…So a couple that is doing the overseas move needs to have substantial emergency savings available. Otherwise, they’d either have to go into debt to return home or beg family for funds to return home, which would be awkward and embarrassing…So, not having the savings would be a major argument against doing the move.
 
Perfect!!!
Here is one of the best I have ever seen on this:

“WIVES, BE SUBJECT TO YOUR HUSBANDS”:
THE AUTHORITY OF THE HUSBAND ACCORDING TO THE MAGISTERIUM
INTRODUCTION
The words, “Wives, be subject to your husbands,” jar many modern ears. Even though this exhortation comes from an inspired text in Sacred Scripture (Ephesians 5:22), many people—including practicing Catholics—are troubled by what appears to be a relic of Marriage customs “rightly” abandoned by contemporary culture. Those who resist any notion of hierarchy or patriarchy in the social order vigorously reject St. Paul’s concept of Marriage as an attack on the dignity of women. Even those Christians not hostile to Paul’s teaching may believe that given the state of modern society, there is little to be gained by investigating—let alone applying—Paul’s prescriptions concerning the relationship of the spouses. However, one Catholic scholar, Stephen Clark, suggests that the controversy or unease over the family order described in Ephesians 5:21-33 is a relatively recent phenomenon. Re:the question of a “head of the family” he writes, “Few areas in early Christian teaching are as uniform and fewer still were held with the same consistency as long as this one, since the first Christian voices advocating a different approach were raised only in about the nineteenth century.” Clark continues, “There are few instances where it is clearer that a change in the approach of Christians is an abandonment of Christian tradition, & not only of tradition, but of every source of authoritative teaching that can lay claim on a Christian.”
The purpose of this paper is to examine the teaching of the Magisterium of the Catholic Church regarding the authority of the husband in Marriage, which in this area rests largely on the writings of St. Paul. My main concern, as Gerald Vann, O.P. once wrote, “is not with the facts of married life but with the theology that lies behind them& I dont know that mistakes about the facts need invalidate the attempt to state theological principles.” My study of the husband’s authority accepts the following principle from the outset: men & women are equal in dignity, but within Marriage they differ in role or function, & these roles are not interchangeable. The differences between the spouses, i.e. their “complementarity,” permit them to form “one flesh” (Genesis 2:24 and Ephesians 5:31). As Pope John Paul II points out, “In the sphere of what is ‘human’—of what is humanly personal—‘masculinity’ and ‘femininity’ are distinct, yet at the same time they complete & explain each other.” Pius XII states that men & women share an equal dignity since they are children of God & redeemed by Christ, and since they receive common earthly (“be fruitful and multiply”)& supernatural destinies. he adds, “The Creator w/His wonderful ways of bringing harmony out of variety has established a common destiny for all mankind, but He has also given the two sexes different & complementary functions, like two roads leading to the same destination.”https://drive.google.com/file/d/1LurWb77DSf6Rt6gRmMuSQ_ess5XKGnre/view?usp=sharing
 
Not sure why the assumption is this hypothetical husband and wife situation is that they don’t have multiple conversations on a daily basis. Why wouldn’t they both find out the date of departure on the same? That’d only happen if you’re assuming he & his wife don’t speak to each other. Lol, what are they already separated before he gets the job offer, so she didn’t have a clue he was job hunting overseas. Goodness.
Well, that’s changing the hypothetical. The hypothetical was, husband suddenly announces an overseas move with one month’s notice until the family needs to be on the plane and wife needs to immediately acquiesce to her husband’s plan.

I’ve lived overseas (2 years in the Peace Corps) and moved my family several times within the US, and that sounds like a total nightmare. Heck, do the mom and dad and kids even have passports? Everybody might need visas, too, and all sorts of other kinds of paperwork. For example, can the husband or wife drive legally in the new country? Do they have the necessary shots? How do they legally get their dogs or cats into the new country?

I know it can be done that fast under emergency circumstances–but WHY?
Why automatically assume the husband of an obedient Catholic Christian Wife is a domineering husband rather than what he most likely is: a loving Catholic Christian Husband?
Loving is as loving does, and it’s not loving to expect your wife to move to a foreign country if she doesn’t want to move to a foreign country.
 
I’d encourage you to read “WIVES, BE SUBJECT TO YOUR HUSBANDS”: THE AUTHORITY OF THE HUSBAND ACCORDING TO THE MAGISTERIUM
INTRODUCTION posted earlier by Buffalo. The spouses roles are Not interchangeable. The document Buffalo quoted, indicates there are those hostile to St. Paul. That hostility is repeatedly showing itself here in this thread.

We should each individually ask ourselves honestly, do I really want to be on the side hostility towards the Truth or submit to the Catholic Church Teachings on this issue?
 
Also, is this the middle of the school year? Will arriving in the middle of the school year cause the kids problems with regard to starting school in the new location?
 
Does anybody in the family have medical issues where it would be a problem to find competent specialists in the new location?

Is mom pregnant or is there a newborn in the family? Is mom physically up to the demands of the move?

Are there any Catholics in the new area?

How will taxes work? The US government has an unpleasant habit of expecting to tax residents income no matter where they live around the globe.

 
Moving mid-school year. My Mom is a retired school teacher, she’d tell you it happens all the time & is not a problem. I’m Mom to 6 children, 5 living, 3 of whom are adults now. They’ve all moved at least once mid-school year at some point in their lives. It’s truly NOT a big deal. All 3 of my adult children are living productive lives, all employed, one of them married with a child of her own - they’re a military family, so moving continues to be a frequent part of her reality.
 
It is Church teaching. We submit to our wives “need” they submit to our “lead.”
 
Moving mid-school year. My Mom is a retired school teacher, she’d tell you it happens all the time & is not a problem.
The question is not whether it’s doable to change schools mid-year in the US (not ideal, but people do it), but how things work in the new country.
 
It does not say to obey the husband, but to submit. In the Corinthian address, it has the Corinthian women in mind, who were loose, acting willingly submissive to men other than their husbands, while showing lesser regard for their husbands. This submission merely means interaction in which one places their self under vulnerability to the other, as sex and sexual bonds cause to be happening. He is saying that women are to know to save their self displays of vulnerability for the husband alone, letting him have marital respect in fully giving themselves to that mutual vulnerability. In another place, Paul addresses a godlier population’s already existing equal submission of husbands and wives unto one another. Even the old testament never mentions women obeying the husband.

The same Corinthian women interrupted the liturgy to question the validity of Paul’s sacred utterances, as if it were a Greek academy where one voices doubts about fellow philosopher’s opinions. Thus he reacted in the middle of sacred rites to end the stupid questioning of GOD’s higher Words and Thoughts, by saying to shut up and, if their silent husbands wish to, they could explain what they don’t seem to have trouble with secretly. The women were also trying to test their flirtation on Paul, and he denounced this also, saying that he doesn’t allow public attention grabs by the women…
 
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Does anybody in the family have medical issues where it would be a problem to find competent specialists in the new location?

Is mom pregnant or is there a newborn in the family? Is mom physically up to the demands of the move?

Are there any Catholics in the new area?

How will taxes work? The US government has an unpleasant habit of expecting to tax residents income no matter where they live around the globe.
You’re assuming the loving Catholic Christian Husband & Father doesn’t care about or hasn’t carefully consider these issues & doesn’t speak to his wife before making his final decision? That would be absurd. It’s making me wonder, what kind of man did you choose marry that this hypothetical situation seems to be literally be freaking you out so much?
 
Even the old testament never mentions women obeying the husband.
I don’t think that’s correct (See Sarah and Abraham), but we also have the story of Abigail, who went against her husband’s will (he wanted to refuse food to David, who was a dangerous war lord/guerilla type) and saved her husband and her household from slaughter. That’s 1 Samuel 25. In that long passage, it is treated as a matter of course that Abigail is in the right.

See also the NT story of Ananias and Sapphira in Acts 5, where Sapphira is struck dead for cooperating with a plan to pretend to give all the proceeds from a sale to the church but actually hold a lot of it back. The fact that she was being a submissive wife did not keep her from being punished.
 
The question is not whether it’s doable to change schools mid-year in the US (not ideal, but people do it), but how things work in the new country.
What is your point really?

Are you saying that you’d rather have this hypothetical wife not submit to her husband because she’s afraid of how school will be different for her children in a different country. Do you want giving into Fear to be more important than this hypothetical wife’s Husband & Marriage?

If this is what you’re saying, then I say, why Fear at all? Why not trust God that through the wife’s obedience He will bless the family, like he promised? Why not, confront fear by contacting the embassy directly to inquire & learning more about the schooling system. Why not call the school directly and learn first hand? Why give into Fear?

If Fear isn’t your underlying issue with accepting the Teaching of the Church in regards to Marriage, then what is it exactly? Why are “hostile” (as that document Buffalo quoted put it) towards the Church’s Teaching?
 
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Xantippe:
The question is not whether it’s doable to change schools mid-year in the US (not ideal, but people do it), but how things work in the new country.
What is your point really?

Are you saying that you’d rather have this hypothetical wife not submit to her husband because she’s afraid of how school will be different for her children in a different country. Do you want giving into Fear to be more important than this hypothetical wife’s Husband & Marriage?

If this is what you’re saying, then I say, why Fear at all? Why not trust God that through the wife’s obedience He will bless the family, like he promised? Why not, confront fear by contacting the embassy directly to inquire & learning more about the schooling system. Why not call the school directly and learn first hand? Why give into Fear?

If Fear isn’t your underlying issue with accepting the Teaching of the Church in regards to Marriage, then what is it exactly? Why are “hostile” (as that document Buffalo quoted put it) towards the Church’s Teaching?
Having a great marriage is not contingent upon the wife’s obeying the husband’s every command.

My parents had a wonderful 26-year marriage in which small decisions tended to be made by mom and major decisions made collaboratively. Dad never ordered mom to do anything. Was their marriage bad?
 
The loving Catholic husband may not have considered all the implications of moving a whole family overseas in a month.

The answer is to take into consideration his wife’s concerns about the sudden move.

Actually the better move was to have the husband not make a unilateral decision without his wife’s (name removed by moderator)ut and then decide that she has to obey him and as a result gets stuck with the logistical nightmare of trying to coordinate a move in a ridiculously short amount of time while the husband blithely goes to work as usual oblivious to the mess his wife has to sort out.
 
Sounds to me to be perfectly in line with a Catholic Christian Husband & Wife roles of Love & Submission. Your Dad made a decision to give your Mom, his Queen, the authority to make all those smaller decisions. He and your Mom probably discussed all that before they got married - who makes what decisions. You say your parents marriage was wonderful and I competely believe you.

Some people here have a strange idea that submission means the husband must micromanage everything. Lol that sounds crazy. I would venture to guess most husbands don’t have time to do that and most women wouldn’t want to be married to such a husband, but perhaps it works for some? I don’t know. Hard to imagine.
 
Okay, but again why assume the husband doesn’t talk to his wife?
 
I am assuming a case where the husband makes a unilateral decision without his wife’s (name removed by moderator)ut.

It’s been known to happen.

What now?

How does submission look like in these cases?
 
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I am assuming a case where the husband makes a unilateral decision without his wife’s (name removed by moderator)ut.

It’s been known to happen.

What now?
Obviously, that husband was not a true Scotsman, because no true Scotsman would do that.
 
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