I am currently preparing an article for the next edition of the Ordinariate Observer (the official magazine of the Ordinariate of the Chair of St. Peter). This time I will be discussing the role of the Catholic husband and father. I first went to the Catechism of the Catholic Church (1993) to get some useful quotes. I was not surprised, but definitely disappointed. Although it says much about spouses and marriage, it gives no specific references to the role and duties of a husband or father (or of a wife or mother, either). Yes, it does talk about the responsibilities of spouses to each other, but no difference is made between the husband and wife.
If I were a young man preparing for marriage and wanting to know what my role as a future husband and father was, I would be left with virtually nothing except a few generic statements that apply to both husband and wife. Why is this so? Why did the Church spend so much time defining matrimony and the significance of spousal relations and chastity, without giving anything of any usefulness to the specific differences between men and women (which it does affirm the existence of in other places; e.g. CCC 372) in the marriage covenant? There is a long list of the offenses to marriage and the various types of sexual sins, but that only refers to what not to do in marriage.
Furthermore, the references to the role of husband and wife as spouses is not much different than the role of one Catholic to another: be good to each other, forgive one another, and pray for each other (yes, I am simplifying and summarizing, but not much). Thankfully, the new Catechism does refer to the importance of raising children, but it consistently says "parents..." as though there is no distinction between how fathers and mothers are to fulfill their roles. I am not even speaking about the duties in the home (though the Trent Catechism was very specific in this way!), but merely the fact that God made them "male and female" and not some androgynous duo with different shapes. Yes, the devil does want us to believe that is the case, but we are not supposed to give in to him.
Sometimes we teach volumes by what we do not say just as much as by what we do say. I have had quite a few Catholics say that they do not accept the "old teaching" that husbands are the head of the home. Where did that come from? I suspect that it was taught to them in their home as they were growing up, but it also had to be supported by the clergy. Although I cannot get into the minds or motivations of those who wrote the modern Catechism, the choice to leave out this important matter is not a small thing. Few today will read the Trent Catechism (though I wish they would!), and that means that most Catholics who look to the Catechism are left with a very vague (and unhelpful) explanation of what the roles in marriage are.
I do not want to believe that it was done for egalitarian purposes. I will give them the benefit of the doubt that the choice was because the Catechism of the Council of Trent had already done such a stunning job that Rome felt that nothing else needed to be said. Either way, even a passing reference to Trent would have been helpful (it is cited in other places). I will leave aside criticisms and critiques and merely say this: much of our faith has been watered down in many places. Even some clergy have caused grave confusion about what the Church teaches. Let us not allow our families (the "domestic church") to be infected with this same confusion; to do so is to let our children be catechized by the world.
