The "Marital Debt" Explained (with Wendy West)

[@tonyhayes9827]

The first time I was ever close to a woman I felt the truth that she was gifting her `self' to me. The `self' of a human person is the most precious thing God ever made.The human heart is more precious than the entire created universe. This gift of her `self' was utterly precious and something I had done nothing to deserve. But before I was born I had done nothing to deserve life either. I know it's sounds stupid. I didn't exist yet. But that's the point. Life is a free gift we are given, something none of us deserve and we should remember this before we get all self righteous about ourselves. Anyway I felt the precious gift of `self' of another human person and my response was to love this person, because we love precious things, i.e. as St. Thomas said to look after her good. This was a conscious decision and is not under the control of any hormonal urge but an act of the will. To look after her good was to look after all of her. Her heart her mind her body her soul and I would look after her with all of who I am. All my heart all my mind all soul and all my time, i.e. all the days of my life. And I would look after only her at the expense of all others otherwise it would not be all of who I am who loved her. So we give ourselves to each other, we don't take `for ourselves', the other. My life is yours and at your service. I accept all your life, all of who you are, your tears, your sorrows, and your pain as well. I accept your life as my own and if I would look after my own life so I will look after yours. You gift your life to me and in justice/debt to this great gift I give my life to your care. As Wendy said, this is an inherent truth in all of us. But religion is the same concept. It comes under the virtue of Justice. God gave us a great gift, our life. And it is Just we love Him in return, freely. We are the image and likeness and God is the thing itself. That's why we know all these things. We don't just make it up and our hormones are powerless to reveal these things. Us humans are more than a chemistry set of hormones.

[@tonyhayes9827]

@@AnnulmentProof God only knows. Sometimes the Holy Spirit will give us the gifts of knowledge and counsel and the truth of the thing, in certain situations. But we don't always get offered these insights and we all live in our own circumstances and in the end only God can judge a person's heart. When the pharisees asked about divorce Jesus said Yes God permitted it but it wasn't always like that. It was like that in the beginning. Its a bit like mortal sin. Apparently the church teaches its only a mortal sin if you know its mortal sin. If you don't know it, its not mortal sin so better to stay ignorant yes? lol. Sometimes the partner has no intention of gifting their `self' so I guess there's no debt to pay then......but again when we delve into the mystery of the godhead we get out of our depths very quickly and start talking rubbish. I might look at an ideal and just think I'm so far away

[@tonyhayes9827]

@@AnnulmentProof Agree

[@reggiejenkins6458]

@@AnnulmentProof its 100% morally unjust. They are sinning by violating their marriage contract, plain and simple.

[@barb2793]

​@@reggiejenkins6458any man who pushes his wife to have sex when she doesn't want to, and enjoys the sex, is acting like a rapist. Pure and simple. At least a rapist knows what he is doing is wrong.

[@TheAlias433]

I think the illustration Christopher West provides here is great, but I'm a little surprised that he doesn't make mention of the historical understanding of the 'marriage debt' per Aquinas or Augustine. Their understanding - that the marital act is indeed an obligation to be rendered to the other - needs to be reconciled with how he's framing it here, and it would be nice if he would.

[@HawkinsMartinez]

Agreed. Very disappointing.

[@bryansmith7758]

do you have links to where aquinas or augustine talk about this? I want what they say about it.

[@iamnotyou5499]

The Wests have no teaching authority. Many have questioned their claim that they are the only valid interpreters of TOB. Even TOB itself is not authoritative Catholic teaching.

[@iamnotyou5499]

@@bryansmith7758 it won’t let me post the link but it’s Summa Theologiae III-Supplement Question 64 which you can find on New Advent. Also CCC 2364 and canon 1151

[@bryansmith7758]

@@iamnotyou5499 thanks a ton.

[@juanflorenciogonzalezmateo9803]

Is "duty" an abominable word contrary to the dignity of the human person? I think that saying “yes, it is!” would reveal a misunderstanding about duty and freedom, which takes them as contradictory concepts. But these concepts are not contradictory. Saint Paul himself is the one who said that “without charity I am nothing”. If I do not want to be nothing, I have a duty to be charitable. Being charitable in marriage involves, for example, being patient with my spouse. Being patient is one aspect of being a gift to my spouse. And responding sexually to her as a gift is no less another aspect of being charitable to her. So, I think the question would have to be: Do spouses have a duty to be charitable to each other? Do I as a free human person have a duty to be a gift to my spouse or not? Another important question would be this: do I have the "right" to use an aspect of myself as a kind of bargaining tool in my relationship with my spouse?

[@ingridappiah1739]

AMEN! I was going to make a comment much like this! But you said it perfectly! It is every spouses duty to be generous with the giving of their bodies to each other! It is only when there is a good reason (like praying as paul says in that passage) that you can deny your spouse. "I'm not in the mood" is not a good enough reason. I love my husband and I have never regretted saying yes even when I didn't feel like it. It is because I love him and he is good to me that I am charitable with the conjugal act. Why wouldn't you want to willingly give of yourself when you love your spouse?

[@ingridappiah1739]

@@AnnulmentProof sex is dued to you, you are owed sex, because your spouse's body belongs to you and your body is theirs. That's why it is sinful to deny them without good cause. However, because sex has to be a free gift, because of free will, you cannot force yourself upon your spouse, even when their reason for denial is not of good cause. You must always respect their free will just as God respects ours.

[@veddermn8]

The Church hammers home the value of modesty, self denial and chastity so it feels weird to then have sexual release implicitly "required"

[@veddermn8]

Being "charitable" by putting all the kids to bed so she can go to her yoga class is different than being "charitable" and having another mouth to feed and tuition to pay though. There are different levels of "charitable" asks in a marriage. For cases like this, I don't think declining a romantic gesture should be looked at as being a cold partner or a sin.

[@reggiejenkins6458]

@@veddermn8 your take is not remotely Catholic, and you denigrate human life by reducing children to their financial cost.

[@UnOrthodox_Christian]

Fr Ripperger led me here and this is almost the exact opposite of the explanation he gave.

[@Rochelle937]

Which is good, because Fr Ripperger is way out of line at times. He does his own thing. Stay away.

[@maryrankin9869]

So deep.....love is respecting...respecting is love. Thats' how I interpret this message.

[@maryrankin9869]

@@AnnulmentProof What do you mean its not in the contract?

[@maryrankin9869]

@@AnnulmentProof So what is love?

[@maryrankin9869]

@@AnnulmentProof What is GW48?

[@maryrankin9869]

@@AnnulmentProof My mother always told me love was an action. You are too deep for me. My sister told me to marry for money and learn to love. Ciao

[@maryrankin9869]

@@AnnulmentProof This must be Latin?

[@benmolenda]

This is an entirely incomplete explanation of the marital debt, as laid out by the Angelic Doctor, Thomas Aquinas. In the summa, Aquinas explains that, because of our responsibility to our spouses soul, and our corresponsibility in its salvation, we do in fact owe our spouse the debt of our marital union, insofar as offering ourselves can prevent them from straying into impurity.

[@bryansmith7758]

do you have a link to where st. thomas says this?

[@Rochelle937]

@@bryansmith7758 So what if Aquinas said this? It is not binding. The Catechism says nothing about a marital debt, which is a very dangerous idea. In fact, Blessed Henry Newman stated, "The Fathers of the Church possess authority but not sufficient authority in themselves." They do not enjoy the charism of infallibility.

[@barb2793]

Any man who pushes his wife to have sex when she doesn't want to, and enjoys it, is acting like a rapist. It's evil, no matter how you dress it up in your mind.

[@iamnotyou5499]

@@Rochelle937 canon 1151 is binding. If you don’t think Aquinas understands the church better than you do, that’s a stretch. Neumann isn’t referring to contradicting divine revelation in the scriptures. Neumann doesn’t trump St Paul. If you want to hear a pope say it check out Casti Connubii #25.

[@aretrograde7745]

If anyone is interested in understanding the opposing perspective, here is a recent video from Timothy Gordon on it: kzbin.info/www/bejne/an_Ld5aYjtd3jdE

[@debclimeo6621]

Shame on you for giving that narcissist cretin any validity at all. The man’s a self absorbed tyrant.

[@aretrograde7745]

@@debclimeo6621 I was trying to be impartial and civil, but you seem to be entirely unconcerned about maintaining a respectable conversation.

[@aretrograde7745]

@@AnnulmentProof I don’t think that is the case. *(That the necessity of the unitive aspect of the conjugal act cuts against the conjugal debt).

[@qwerty20000000003]

Timothy Gordon is completely correct about this. Everyone who challenges him instantly backs away whenever he offers to debate/discuss

[@Matt-ck3pp]

​@@AnnulmentProof It is certainty required in every act of the marital act. The "unitive" end means the complete gift of self in the marital act, itself. This is not a subjective dimension ex. the husband doesn't really want to have sex that night but the marital debt requires him to. If that is the case, the husband, in this example, is even more giving of himself in self gift in overcoming his selfish desire to enter into the marital act.

[@sofiaholmann]

Wow. This is really beautiful

[@bethanyann1060]

Is it ever a mortal sin to refuse?

[@anzot6903]

Aquinas says yes. If you have no real reason (I'm tired, it's been a long day, I'm not on the mood) it is a mortal sin. If you have a legitimate reason (significant health issues, genuine exhaustion, having just had sex and being unable to complete it again) then requesting spouse has the duty to refrain from requesting, and the other spouse has the ability and even the moral duty to refuse (it would be a duty to refuse if, for instance, sex would put an unborn child at risk).

[@bethanyann1060]

@@anzot6903 Thank you for the info

[@SenorCinema]

@@anzot6903 not being in the mood is a real reason to refuse.

[@anzot6903]

@@SenorCinema not according to Aquinas and other moral doctors. That was what I was recapping.

[@CatholicTraditional]

@@anzot6903Correct. The couple is expected to have sex upon request of one of the parties unless there’s a grave reason.

[@iamnotyou5499]

This is 100% incorrect. Read Aquinas who expounds on it in depth. Read Paul’s letter in Greek. The Greek clearly says that neither spouse has the right or license to deny sex without exception. Read the catechism. Read canon law. None of those agree with your interpretation. You gave your spouse the right to sex on your wedding day til death do you part. This idea that your marriage vows turn on and off during your marriage is just wrong.

[@Rochelle937]

That is ridiculous. We are Catholics. We don't read the Bible and then interpret it the way that we want to. That's what evangelical Protestants do. What Aquinas said has never been binding Catholic dogma. There is nothing about some marital debt in the Catechism. It says the opposite, that intimacy should be in moderation. What you are promoting is sexual abuse, pure and simple, that people have a "right" to have sex with the other spouse because of being married. And why would you want to have sex with your wife when she doesn't want to? Sick, despicable thinking, straight from the devil, which makes traditional Catholic men look like a bunch of chauvinist pigs.

[@barb2793]

Why would you want to have sex with your wife if she doesn't want to?

[@Rochelle937]

Aquinas did not speak with infallibility. And we are not Protestants who read the Bible and interpret according to our own will. There is nothing in the Catechism of the Catholic Church about marital debt or a "right" to sex after you get married. This is a wicked idea.

[@iamnotyou5499]

@@Rochelle937 Canon 1151 agrees with Paul and Aquinas. I’m not sure how you can read Paul here and understand it to mean anything other than what it clearly says. The marriage debt has always been church teaching.

[@iamnotyou5499]

@@Rochelle937 CCC 2364 says you are wrong as does canon 1151

[@davidmascarenas9830]

This is a very questionable explanation of the marital debt from a Christian perspective. St. Thomas Acquinas, Doctor of the Church would probably not agree with this. FJ Sheed provides a much more Catholic perspective: "In entering into this union, each has given to the other (and to the other exclusively) the right to sexual union. Notice that sexual union is a thing due, a right: either is entitled to demand it of the other, and, unless there is a very serious reason, neither can refuse it to the other. For the man to refuse his wife or the wife her husband without good reason would be a grave sin. But notice that it is a right, not to any sexual union but to normal sexual union, the union by which, in the way of nature, children are conceived. Abnormal sexual unions are forbidden to the married as to everyone else; abnormalities in the normal sexual union--all the ingenious trickeries that interfere with it to prevent children being conceived--are likewise forbidden. The sexual act must be wholly itself. And the right thus given is no merely legalistic right--a mere right to the use of the other's body for a specified purpose. The will must go with it; as far as possible--it is not always possible, the feelings cannot be commanded--the whole personality must go with it. The marriage act is a duty, certainly, but it cannot be done simply as a duty: it must be done generously or it is not being done duly. It can never be repeated too often that the sexual union is not simply a union of bodies; it is a union of personalities, expressing itself in the union of bodies. But precisely because the bodily union has so splendid a function, it should itself be splendidly performed. There is a technical competence to be learned by each, for this is an action not of each individually but of two in unison; each surrendered totally to the rhythm of the other. Where it is rightly done, there is an exquisite physical pleasure for both, for so God has made man and woman. Both are meant to experience this pleasure--each must strive that the other may have it. In its fullness the act not only expresses the union of personalities, the total giving of the body uttering the total giving of the self, but intensifies and enriches it. Where there is any want of generosity in the act by either, the union of personalities is impoverished. It is interesting to observe how the Church, pictured often enough as the enemy of sex, insists upon all this." www.ewtn.com/catholicism/library/marriage-and-the-family-11249?fbclid=IwAR02lQjidpZnN1xYZhD1JtK61HJ-nCodjQFXg8tC8MLHJNnWPajwBVAP1rs

[@Rochelle937]

No one should be pressured to have sex unless he or she wants to. What Aquinas said has never been binding Catholic teaching. There is nothing about it in the Catechism. So St. Joseph would have had a "right" to coerce the Blessed Virgin Mary to have conjugal relations -- and whenever he wanted it. Disgusting. Makes me want to run back to the Novus Ordo church, which would never push this evil belief system on others.

[@barb2793]

​@@Rochelle937a man who tells his wife that he has a right to have sex with her is not a man.

[@djb5255]

How is this different from my understanding of 'Marital Debt' before first being told about 'Marital Debt' and its plain meaning?

[@veddermn8]

The Church hammers home the value of modesty, self denial and chastity so it feels weird for it also then have sexual release implicitly "required" or denial of it to be looked down on.

[@Rochelle937]

The Church does not require sex between spouses. It is not in the Catechism of the Catholic Church. This dangerous idea is being promoted by a bunch of licentious men who obviously have no respect for their wives. Coercing a woman to have sex when she doesn't want to (telling her it's a mortal sin to say no) is sexual abuse. It is not love. It certainly isn't Christianity. It isn't even sex; it is abuse.

[@stacienicholson6525]

So good ❤

[@pilot2502]

Any one who requires that term to have sex with your spouse makes me think of Harvy Weinstein.

[@reggiejenkins6458]

This is a super limp wristed take. Demanding sex from a spouse doesn’t ever violate their dignity. Marriage is not just a spiritual contract, but a physical one also. Getting hung up on the translated word “debt” just muddies the waters. We should be smart enough to not dwell on the semantics. If our spouses possess us, we owe each other free, good, unlimited sex. So yes, it is a debt, even though in 2023 America that word has a negative connotation. Yes, it is possible to abuse that, but that is the same as anything else and doesn’t need anything more than a passing mention, all decent adults understand the concept of physical abuse. Spouses have a moral and functional requirement to knock their spouses socks off on the daily.

[@reggiejenkins6458]

@@AnnulmentProof I would interpret things as being that the Church’s stance is that marriage is a physical contract at a minimum, but not only. If it was truely only physical, then the “ideal” and “most” Catholic marriage would be purely physical and devoid of love, sacrifice, loyalty, etc. It seems a reactionary overreaction, the same way the “marriage is about love, not the physical” is just overboard duncey.

[@tripplerizz9382]

so true. i feel like this content is in direct disagreement w church doctrine

[@tripplerizz9382]

@@AnnulmentProof i dont know what to do about this. so many false teachings and redefinitions of our sacred institutions. denial of the marital act is a mortal sin, and so many teachers in the church are jumping through hoops to deny that fact. and so many marriages are being hurt as a result

[@bethaniacounseling]

www.scborromeo.org/ccc/p2s2c3a7.htm Marriage is not a contract. It's a covenant.

[@Rochelle937]

@@tripplerizz9382 Denial of the marital act is not a mortal sin. That is nonsense, promoted by a bunch of chauvinist pigs, who call themselves men but nothing could be further than the truth.

[@Rochelle937]

There is no such thing as a marital debt. The Catechism of the Catholic Church has nothing on it. In fact, it says the opposite, that sex should be in moderation. And Pope Paul VI wrote that sexual relations should only occur between consenting spouses who want to have relations; otherwise, he says, it is abuse.

[@barb2793]

Any man who pushes his wife to have sex, telling her it is his right, is not a man.

[@iamnotyou5499]

St Paul says it is in 1 Corinthians 7:4 and that is divinely inspired sacred scripture. Aquinas concurs in the Summa. Pope Pius XI concurs in Casti Connubii #25. Canon 1151 also confirms it. This has always been the teaching of the church. How is forcing unwanted celibacy on your spouse not abuse?

[@godogsgo100]

Hmmm. 🤔 what about all those infinite excuses of wives saying “not tonight honey, I have a headache”? Men never get headaches. Just sayin.