281. By divine disposition man, by his very nature social, must live life in society so that he may attain his end, both the immediate end of this life and the ultimate end of the other life. From this natural sociality of man it has come about that man has always and everywhere lived, and henceforth lives, in a twofold society, domestic and civil. The first society, and the foundation and essential condition of the other societies, civil and ecclesiastical, is domestic society. It is composed of a threefold social element: of conjugal society, which consists in the conjunction of man and wife; of parental society, which arises between parents and children; of masterly society, which arises between master and servants. From these three societies the family is completely constituted. Therefore obligations of a threefold kind are had within the family: obligations of spouses, obligations of parents and children, obligations of masters and servants. And on account of the analogy, on the one hand, of parents and children with teachers and pupils, and on the other hand of masters and servants with employers and workers, in this place there must also be treated the obligations of teachers and pupils and the obligations of employers and workers.

Article First. On the Obligations of Spouses

The root of the obligations which fall upon spouses is marriage, by which domestic society is constituted. But the obligations which flow from this root are of three kinds: namely, some are referred to the persons, some to the goods, some to the body of the spouses. Only the obligations of the first kind pertain to this precept; of these, some are mutual, while others are proper to either spouse.

282. Mutual obligations. Since Christian marriage, in which these obligations are founded, is an image of the union of Christ and the Church, to which Christ communicated Himself wholly, between spouses there ought to flourish the most perfect union and communion both of souls and of bodies.

1. Therefore spouses are bound to mutual love: husbands are commanded to love their wives, wives to love their husbands.¹ So intimate ought this union of love to be that a spouse ought to prefer spouse, in effective love or in bringing help, even to parents and children, unless these are in extreme necessity.

Therefore spouses sin against piety who pursue one another with hatred, offend one another with quarrels and insults, spread calumnies, and by jealousy, harshness, or neglect of duties render life very troublesome to the other party.

2. They are bound to bring mutual assistance to each other, both as to body and as to soul.²

Spouses complete each other not only insofar as they are the principle of generation, but also in the actions and necessities of human life. In the work of salvation they promote each other, both because they pray for one another and because they help one another by word and example, and especially because they patiently bear defects committed from human frailty.

3. They are bound to render mutually to each other the conjugal debt and also to preserve conjugal fidelity;³ hence it happens that every sin, whether internal or external, committed against chastity with another person or concerning another person, has the character of adultery.

4. Since they cannot satisfy these obligations otherwise, spouses are bound to common habitation, indeed also to common table and bed.⁴

a. Yet this obligation does not affect husband and wife in the same way. For the choice of domicile pertains to the husband, but the wife must follow the husband to the chosen domicile, even if he changes domicile without a just cause. But the husband is not bound to follow a wife migrating elsewhere, unless the migration is made from a necessary cause.

b. Spouses can by mutual consent separate from each other even for a longer time, unless there is present danger of incontinence or the education of children would suffer detriment from it. But one spouse cannot without grave fault depart for a long time against the will of the other unless a grave cause is present. And although the husband of himself can be absent for a brief time even without the wife's knowledge and against her will, nevertheless, with attention to the relation of love between spouses, it is not becoming that the husband be absent even for a day without the wife's knowledge.

¹ Cf. Eph. 5:25; Col. 3:18; Tit. 2:4; 1 Tim. 2:15.

² Gen. 2:18.

³ 1 Cor. 7:4.

⁴ Cf. Matt. 19:5.

283. Obligations and rights of the husband. 1. To the husband from legitimate marriage belongs marital power, by force of which he is the head of the wife, who in the governance of domestic affairs and of the family is truly subject to him; but he must protect the wife and treat her as spouse and companion.

Although coercive power is not contained in marital power, nevertheless the husband has the right of requiring from the wife not only reverence and obedience, but also labor suitable to her state and condition.

2. He is bound to support his wife, by furnishing food, clothing, habitation, and other things necessary for life, so that according to her condition she can live at home and abroad.

He sins if he refuses or neglects to provide for his wife according to the measure of her state concerning things necessary for food and clothing, even if he married her without dowry; if he does not care for the governance of the house and the family estate; if he treats her harshly after the manner of a maidservant; if he demands from her things which women of the same dignity and condition are not accustomed to furnish.

3. To the husband belongs paternal power over children, by force of which he can order not only their things and actions, but even their persons, to the good of the family.

Not only the ancient pagan peoples extended this power beyond just limits, who against natural right vindicated to themselves the power of killing and selling their children, but also the Christian peoples of the Middle Ages, who contracted betrothals and marriages for their children or offered them to monasteries.

284. Obligations and rights of the wife. 1. Although the wife is subject to the husband, nevertheless she is the husband's wife, not concubine; the husband's companion, not maidservant; and as mother she has the right of educating the offspring, certainly dependently on the father.

From the mode by which God made the first parents, it is clear that dominion belongs to the man: for man is not from woman, but woman from man;¹ moreover, God indeed gave the same nature to woman, yet added her to man as a help: "Let us make him a help like unto himself";² "Man was not created for woman, but woman for man."³ St. Paul both expressly calls the man the head of the woman,⁴ and implicitly does so by comparing the union of man and woman to the conjunction of Christ and the Church, whose head Christ is.⁵ Hence he infers: "As the Church is subject to Christ, so also let women be to their husbands in all things."⁶ What we learn from revelation, the nature of the thing also teaches: for domestic society, as any society, needs authority; but domestic authority by the institution of nature is in the man.

2. She has the right of receiving from the husband congruous support; likewise the right and obligation of caring for the family estate, yet with due dependence on the husband.⁷

She sins if from the goods of the family she makes expenses without the consent of the husband and against the custom of women of the same condition; if she arrogates to herself command or administration of the house, except the case in which the man neglects it or is unfit for it; if she omits care of the family or domestic business.

3. Ordinarily she is bound to follow the domicile which the husband has chosen as head of the family.

¹ 1 Cor. 11:8.

² Gen. 2:18.

³ 1 Cor. 11:9.

⁴ 1 Cor. 11:3.

⁵ Eph. 5:23.

⁶ Eph. 5:24.

⁷ Col. 3:18; 1 Pet. 3:1.