Marriage

The Nature of Marriage

    Marriage is ordered primarily towards procreation. We hear marriage is both unitive and procreative. This is true, but the order is important. Procreation is first, unitive (love) is second. Placing these two ends of marriage on equal footing will lead to serious misunderstandings, at best, mortal sin at worst.

    Marriage is a covenant.  A mere contract is an exchange- I give you this, and you give me that. A covenant is- I give you all of myself, and you give me all of yourself. In other words, the stakes are higher.  This is not to say marriage is not a contract at all. In fact, the contractual nature of marriage has been under appreciated. Marriage is a matter of justice. A husband and wife give themselves entirely to one another. The body of one spouse, is at the reasonable disposal of the other spouse. Failure to use your body at the service of your spouse can even be as a mortal sin (as is the case for refusing the marital debt when reasonably requested). 

Marriage is a microcosm of Christ's love for the Church and the Blessed Trinity. 

The Authority Structure 

    As for Christ's love for the Church, we learn the Authority structure within marriage. The husband is the head of his wife as Christ is the head of the Church. This is not meant in a chauvinistic way. A team must have a captain. As the Church is female in nature (receptive and obedient to the action of Christ), so too is the wife in a receptive and obedient to her husband. The reproductive organs of the spouses make this spiritual reality present in their bodies. One gives, one receives.

    Men were equipped by God to lead. The woman was made by God primarily to have children and raise the children (with her husband's help of course, but the primary responsibility of child rearing falls on the mother). The husband's role is to provide and protect, first spiritually, and secondly materially. The husband should always be occupied in pursuit of providing and protecting (supernaturally and naturally). The husband is never meant to be idle or lazy. The greater responsibility lies on the husband because of his Authority. The husband will be judged by God, to a large extent, on what he has done and failed to do for his family under his care. 

    The husband should look to St Joseph, who God willed to have Authority over two people, both of which exceeded him in excellence by an order of infinity. And yet, God still willed this order for His household on earth. A woman will be judged by God, to a large extent by how well she served and obeyed her husband and raised the children. The father is the head, and the mother is the heart of the family.

The Marital Act (intercourse)

As for the Trinity, The Love of the Father and the Son is (the 4 F's): 

Free

Full

Faithful

Fruitful (spirating the Holy Ghost)

    The marital act must reflect each of these 4 F's. Contraception is an obvious evil because it intentionally blocks fruitfulness. But there are other evils which are often ignored. Natural Family Planning (NFP) is permitted for grave reasons only. If there is no proportionate grave reason, a couple may not use NFP. A couple may practice abstinence for a period of time if both parties agree. But, we must bear in mind, that if one of the partners reasonably asks for his partner to render him the marital debt, the partner must oblige under the pain of mortal sin again justice (each party has freely given his body to the other).

     Remember the first instruction God gave to mankind, through Adam and Eve was to be fruitful and multiply. In the Bible, children are always viewed as a blessing. Our society has been infected by erroneous (at best) views on almost all topics, not the least of which being on the marital act. Our Lady of Fatima said that more souls go to hell because sins of the flesh than any other sin. So we must take this seriously. Most couples do not realize that sexual sins committed within marriage is even worse than outside of marriage because of the sacred dignity it possesses. Of course, the 6th and 9th commandment permit no parvity of matter. All sexual sins are grave and merit hell. 

     

The Marital Act 

    Here, for clarity, we have to be more explicit and direct. Marital acts, must, like all human actions, be ordered towards their proper end and be becoming of a being endowed with reason. People are subjects, not objects. We must always treat people as subjects, never objectifying them, especially our spouse. More plainly, married couples do not have a free pass to engage in any sexual act with their spouse, as long as it's consensual. Some acts are not fitting for humans who have been gifted an intellect in the image of God. 

The Flower and Vas Analogy:

A simple analogy will help. A man's reproductive organ is shaped like a flower. The woman is shaped like a vas. Only the flower goes into the vas. And the vas may only host the flower. Every marital act must end with the man's seed inside the woman's vas, ideally with a mutual climax (though this is not necessary). A woman's climax is not necessary for the completed marital act, therefore masturbatory/oral acts on her part or her husbands is not justifiable.

    We must bear in mind that the means never justify the ends. We may not take any actions we'd like before or after the marital act. If an act is intrinsically evil outside of the marital act (eg. masturbation/manual sex, oral sex, anal sex/stimulation) the act is evil/disordered/sinful before, during, and after the marital act. An intrinsically evil act never ceases to be intrinsically evil. 

     Oral Sex is prohibited because the flower is never permitted to go anywhere except the vas. Just as this act is intrinsically evil for the man to receive, it is also evil to perform.

    Masturbatory acts/manual stimulation may not occur on oneself or each other, even in the name of "helping the act along." The husband and wife may touch each other to elicit arousal, but not in a masturbatory manner. 

    Anal sex is evil because the flower may not enter anywhere except the vas. Anal stimulation is out because it does not, strictly speaking, advance the marital act, even if it does produce arousal. Many anal acts are also unbecoming of a being endowed with reason. Just because we have heard, seen or experienced that something is arousing or pleasurable, does not mean it is proper to humans.

    Dirty talk is prohibited because it is contrary to charity (willing the good of the other for the sake of God). Spouses may tell each other how much they love one another and each others' bodies. You just don't get raunchy with it, with all the slang terms and objectifying the other person.