Luceat!

There’s another great question raised by the recent set of posts. In short, “how is a man to subject himself to his wife in the context of mutual submission?”

It seems that if it is a man’s mission to lay down his life for his wife and play a humble role in her sanctification, then there must not only be the possibility of an external death, but a very real internal death as well. We often call this “dying to preference.” We die to ourselves for Christ so that he might live within us, and in that noble death a man ought to take into consideration the closest member of Christ’s body to himself: his wife.

How do we men do that? Here’s a (very) short list of ideas:

• if I have to give up my favorite sport to spend time with my wife that she needs, I really ought not think twice about it,
• if I have to leave a career that brings me more fulfillment than I’ve ever had in my life so that I can get health coverage for my wife and kids, I should prefer to do that,
• if my wife is allergic to my deodorant, I should switch brands, or even use those silly rocks if necessary

Now, here’s the scary part of all this. The word “mutual” is indeed a word that implies the involvement of two people. And just as not all men are paragon examples of St. Joseph, neither are all women that of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Surprise, surprise. It’s a rather daunting task to figure out what sort of woman you’re pursuing before you’re married, and it takes all sorts of creative listening and observation in the wild to find character of true quality or determine a poverty of it. For the sake of Christ, our sanity, and our children’s upbringing, it’s a task worth taking on. We hear enough about the ways men use or neglect women in relationships to list them without thinking, but I think that the opposite situation could use a little lighting. There are essentially three scenarios that husbands fall into:

1. the man who is unfortunate enough to have married a woman who willy-nilly demands that her personal preferences be met no matter how frivolous they might be,
2. then there is the man whose wife allows him to act on his own through a loving request, simply letting him know all the legitimate needs of her heart,
3. and finally there is the man whose wife is so passive/resigned/distrustful that she won’t bother with telling him how she needs to be loved, content to wither away in obscurity.

I hope it’s clear that situation #2 is the ideal. A real man who loves his wife would jump at the chance to help her and is indeed looking for those opportunities on a regular basis. However that same man will eventually and rightly feel used in situation #1 and unappreciated or unnecessary in situation #3. So let it be known that in general men need essentially two things in life and love: the opportunity to fulfill a legitimate desire, and the respect, trust, and support of those who have that desire.

In order that situation #2 work out and not devolve into situation #1 or #3, the man actually has to step up: do something, take initiative, and find hidden opportunities throughout his day. Responding in trust to the desires of the wife without constant critique and suspicious interpretation is one mark of a husband who desires to lay down his life for his bride as Christ laid himself down for us all. Perhaps we all can think of the man who constantly calls into question everything his wife says, making her feel inadequate or beneath his consideration. Clearly, we’re shooting for the opposite effect.

If we are to mutually submit to one another, the woman must trust that the man is offering himself as a gift to her, and the man must trust that the woman will receive his love and respond again in love. Without this trust, doubt brews, resentment grows, and a coldness colder than spit during a North Dakota blizzard sets in. Certainly, there must be a greater joy to be had in living for others for Christ’s sake than in any amount of self-satisfaction regardless of the personal suffering that must be endured. That is the challenge that men must live up to, and if we can tear our muscles to pieces working out, how much more should we be able simply stretch our horizons of patience and perseverance in matters of the heart? If we can break bones to make a touchdown, certainly we are able to sacrifice our bodies and health to give ourselves to the most important person in our lives. And if we can stay up all night playing Halo, then maybe we could give up just one night to pray for our spouses or future spouses in the presence of the Lord.