"Love is in no way essential to a successful marriage." ~ General Léonard Duphot
Marriage isn't "I promise to love you until I stop loving you." It's "I promise to make a conscious decision to continue to love you even when it's hard because I'm aware no one is perfect, but you are worth it."
Traditionalists always argued that physical intimacy and emotional intimacy ought to be linked. But they were accused of removing female agency with such linkage and condemned for "mansplaining." How about this: no feministsplaining and no mansplaining when it comes to sex? How about we instead focus on communication between men and women? How about sexual partners demand more from one another than physical release so they aren't disappointed that they're being treated as sex objects? A system prizing love and commitment doesn't require nearly the amount of explanation as a system that dispenses with both.
This doesn’t mean that a man has a license to be lazy, abusive, or uncaring. Precisely the opposite. He is challenged to live up to the respect his wife has for him. But if his wife parcels out her respect on a reward system, the husband will feel demoralized and empty. He will not feel at home in his home. He will not have the sense of masculine purpose and fulfillment that his family life ought to afford him. After a while, he will dread coming home at night, preferring to remain at work where his contributions are appreciated and his talents are admired. Now the marriage has entered a very dangerous place. If a man feels more like a man when he’s away from his wife than when he’s with her, disaster is right around the corner. The marriage is already half-dead. It won’t take much to finish it off.
We all seem to understand that love is supposed to be unconditional, but we struggle to see how respect must be the same. I wonder: how would we respond to a husband who says he is not going to love his wife because she hasn’t earned it? What would we say about a man who chooses to act unlovingly toward his wife because she isn’t doing a good job of keeping the house together, or she doesn’t have dinner ready when he comes home, or she isn’t properly satisfying him in other ways, or she isn’t doing all the things he demands on the timetable that he prefers? Even if it were true that the wife is slacking in her responsibilities, we would consider the man to be a monster for holding that over her head or using it as an excuse to degrade and demean her.
The love between husband and wife, consecrated by God, serves as the foundation of a properly ordered family. Their love literally gives birth to their children. As the kids grow older, they will depend upon that love and look to it for comfort, security, and direction. Husband and wife were there before the kids existed, and, if they honor their vows and stay alive and healthy, they’ll be there together long after the kids have moved out and started their own families. If spouses put their kids first, what do they do before the kids are born, and what will they do after they leave? And anyway, how can it be proper and right to love a child more than you love the person who gave you that child?
A man in this situation is called nonetheless to endure, to fight for his family, and never to be unfaithful to his wife or leave her. But if he does wander, it should be noted that he is not the only traitor in the marriage. She betrayed him. She promised him a wife and instead gave him a stepmother. The two have now betrayed each other, each in their own way. There are two sides to every story, as they say. I think this is the side that is not often told.
So, why do we accept this approach from women? Why is it considered appropriate for a woman to order her husband around, but not the reverse? Why is it normal in our culture for a woman to assign a list of chores to her husband (the “Honey Do List,” we call it), yet we would think a man tyrannical and possibly abusive if he gave his wife her own list of mandatory assignments for the day? "Headed to work, honey. Your chore list is on the fridge." Why do we think nothing of women who sit around complaining to each other about their husbands, even when those very same women would be devastated if their husbands did the same? Why is it acceptable for a woman to kick a man out of his own bed and banish him to the living room like a scolded puppy, while it would be seen as entirely unacceptable for a man to pull the same stunt with his wife? Imagine a wife saying to her girlfriends, “I’m really in the doghouse, girls. My husband made me sleep on the couch last night.” Her friends would probably tell her to call the police and file for divorce.
Everything in a family hinges on and depends upon the love between the mother and father. The family lives or dies by it. We may gain some emotional benefit from spoiling our kids, but what they need — what gives them the greatest benefit — is to see a father who honors his wife and a mother who respects her husband. One way or another, whether we like or not, they will learn far more about love from observing us than they will from the hugs and kisses we heap on them.
A husband does not need to earn his wife’s respect any more than a wife needs to earn her husband’s love. A wife ought to respect her husband because he is her husband, just as he ought to love and honor her because she is his wife. Your husband might “deserve” it when you mock him, berate him, belittle him, and nag him, but you don’t marry someone in order to give them what they deserve. In marriage, you give them what you’ve promised.