Question Four: On the Offices of Spouses

830. Mutual offices of spouses. - Besides the offices of justice, which regard either the administration of goods, concerning which it was already spoken in n. 181-182, or the conjugal debt itself of intercourse to be rendered (I Cor. VII, 3) and conjugal fidelity to be preserved, concerning which it must be spoken in the treatise on matrimony, there are three things which spouses owe each other by natural and divine law from piety: mutual love, mutual help and consolation, and cohabitation.

1. Sincere and intense mutual love. For since they are as one flesh (Mt. XIX, 5), they ought also to be as one heart; for this reason St. Paul commands husbands to love their wives as Christ loved the Church (Eph. V, 25), and wives to love their husbands (Tit. II, 4; Col. III, 18; I Tim. II, 15). This love must be not only affective but also effective, so that spouses furnish help to each other, especially in necessities, and, says Prummer, Th. M. II, n. 590, "avoid disordered egoism, contumelious words, harshness, and especially jealousy, which is wont to be the sepulcher of conjugal love."

2. Mutual help and consolation: for in this they complete each other, because the gifts of one are the complement of the other. Whence God says: It is not good for man to be alone; let us make him a help like unto himself (Gen. II, 18). Hence matrimony is not only a union of bodies but also a union of souls, and a special friendly society by which spouses promise service and assistance to each other.

3. Cohabitation at one table and bed (can. 1128; C. C., a. 214); this is a corollary of the others, altogether required for attaining the ends of matrimony: the education of offspring and mutual help. Whence it is said: For this cause a man shall leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife, and they shall be two in one flesh (Gen. II, 24; Mt. XIX, 5).

831. Special offices of the husband. - The husband is the head of the wife and family; and therefore there belongs to him the power of governing not only the children and the family property, but also the wife, who nevertheless is not his handmaid but a worthy partner. Hence he is bound:

1. to furnish to the wife suitable sustenance according to his state, and support and protection;

2. to take care that the wife faithfully fulfill her duties;

3. also to correct her when delinquent; but correction ordinarily ought to consist in words brought forth without anger and hatred: for graver correction consisting in deeds or in moderate blows is rarely opportune or even legitimate.

Hence per se he sins gravely a) if he denies food to the wife, or, although he can, does not procure it, unless she has departed by her own fault;

b) if he treats his wife very harshly and roughly, or compels her to labors which altogether disgrace her condition;

c) if he affects his wife with contumelious or defamatory words;

d) if without cause he impedes her as to the practice of religion;

e) if he gravely beats her;

f) if he greatly afflicts her by his drunken excesses and other disordered passions;

g) if he is very negligent in the governance of family property.

832. Special offices of the wife. - The wife ought to reverence her husband as head and ruler, and furnish him due obedience; whence the Apostle warns: Women, be subject to husbands, as it behooves in the Lord (Col. III, 18; Eph. V, 33). For this reason she ought to expend diligent care in domestic affairs, as her condition demands; and to obey the husband in the governance of the house and in good morals.

Hence per se the wife sins gravely: a) if by quarrels or words she provokes her husband to grave anger or blasphemy;

b) if, despising her husband, she herself wishes to govern, or is notably disobedient, unless the husband commands irrationally;

c) if she gravely neglects domestic affairs, indulging idleness or amusements; or if, given to luxury, she exasperates her husband;

d) if she habitually injects herself into the administration of the house, not in the manner of one helping but of one dominating; unless there is a just cause, such as if the husband, as a spendthrift, squanders the goods of the family or is unfit for management: yet let her not think this last too easily.