Growth-Centered Approach to Marital Love
For a few decades, Catholic theology is trying to found marriage on the ‘love’ of the couple as a response to the increasing importance of interpersonal relationship in (Western) marriages. However, as “love” is open to multiple interpretations, the response remains ambiguous. Therefore, an attempt that clarifies the meaning of love in marriage might be useful.
The main thesis of the paper: marital love needs to be regarded as a web of relationships that are mutually linked on the basis of the personal growth of the spouses.
In order to substantiate this thesis, we begin with the concrete example of the increasing importance of the personal relationship in marriage in Kerala. The second part will focus on the question this gives rise to in the theology of marriage. It will be followed by a discussion of how an emphasis on the growth-based interconnectedness of various relationships in marriage can effectively answer the question.
1. The Shift from the Arranged to the ‘Assisted’ Marriage
Due to various reasons, marriage is no more a mere part of the family, but the other way round.
The assisted marriage, which highly values the determinative role of the prospective spouses in the selection of the marriage partner, indicates the emerging importance of the interpersonal relationship of the couple in marriage.
2. The Question to Be Answered
(This section below is in a table form in the original. Unfortunately, I can't put it here in a table form. Please refer to the original file sent to you in attachment)
The importance of the interpersonal relationship of the couple has its impact upon the other relationships in marriage.
Various Relationships
Arranged Marriage
Assisted Marriage
Self-love:
Arranged Marriage : Self-sacrifice for the family
Assisted Marriage: Importance of the well-being of the individual
Expects greater reciprocity
Love of God
Arranged Marriage: Author or stipulator of the institution of marriage
Motive for the acceptance of difficulties in marriage
Assisted Marriage: Source of love
Does not demand what is impossible
Love of the Families of Origin
Arranged Marriage: Priority for the well-being and harmony of the family
Assisted Marriage: Independence from the family
Love of Children
Arranged Marriage: Agents to continue the family line
Hierarchical
Assisted Marriage: Fruits of or intruders to the relationship of the couple
Less in number
Love of Neighbour
Arranged Marriage: Family as the basic cell
Through children
Assisted Marriage: Retreat from the neighbour to the private world of the couple
It seems that the personal spousal relationship could be integral only when a similar emphasis is recognised in the other relationships. Hence the fundamental question is what is the link between spousal relationship and the other relationships in marriage?
3. Growth-based Mutuality
In order to answer the above question, we have to first understand the unique element that the emphasis on the interpersonal relationship of the couple highlights. A close analysis might suggest that the interpersonal relationship lays much emphasis on the personal growth of the spouses through the love of communion. The spousal relationship is not a mere means for an end exterior to it, for example, the harmony of the family, but an end in itself, the well-being of the spouses. A critical approach may distinguish the focus on the growth of the spouses from selfishness. The personal growth of the spouses, which means the realisation of the potentials of the spouses, is not limited to them, but shared with the other. To go a step further, it can be stated that the spouses are not capable of realising the growth through the spousal relationship alone, because human relationships are interconnected.
3.1. Spousal Love and Self-Love
Self-love means the acceptance of oneself and the care to realise one’s own potentials. Spousal love contributes to this acceptance and the realisation of oneself. On the other hand, self-love is essential to spousal love. A spouse who acts altruistically without any ‘self-interest’ may not be a good lover in a spousal sense. Indeed, self-sacrifice is valued, but as a creative force.
3.2. Spousal Love and the Love of God
The experience of the love of God helps the spouses grow in such a way that they are able to love each other better. God is love and the source of spousal love. The love of God reveals His plan for the marriage. Christ-Church relationship as a model for the couple motivates them. By loving God, the couple are encouraged to take up the additional moral responsibility to love each other. The experience of care and affirmation by God can be a source of growth for the couple. On the other hand, spousal love may help the spouses to grow in their love of God. Love becomes prayer. Spousal love signifies God’s love for His people and Christ’s love for the Church. The affirmation and care provided by the partner points to God’s own love for us. Spousal love is total and may remind each other that he/she is “the temple of God” (1Cor 3:16). The incarnation of God in human flesh and the idea of family as the “domestic Church” support the mutuality of spousal love and the love of God based on the growth of the spouses. The present approach has the advantage of integrating the fundamental openness of the human person towards God with the actual loving of the couple.
3.3. Spousal Love and the Love of the Families of Origin
The family of origin is closely linked to spousal relationship. In a sense, spousal relationship is the repetition of the parental spousal relationship. The experiential wisdom of the parents, the loving support of the families, the caring for the aged parents, etc., might help the spouses grow in their relationship to each other. On the other hand, the growth that the couple realise through the spousal relationship may enrich their relationship with the families of origin. The contribution of children to their parents does not stop with the arrival of adulthood, but continues even through the marriage until the death of the parents. An adequate consideration of the mutual link between spousal love and the love of the families of origin invites our attention to the integral reading of the repeated biblical teaching that “a man leaves his father and mother and clings to his wife, and two of them become one body” (Gen 2:24; Mt 19:5; Mk 10:7; Eph 5:31).
3.4. Spousal Love and the Love of Children
Children are the fruits of spousal love. They are not merely the products of a biological relationship, but incarnation of the loving relationship of the spouses. Spousal love is crucial not only to the birth, but also to the growth of the children. On the other hand, children help the couple to grow personally and thereby in their relationship. Parental love is not simply vertical but horizontal. Family relations are not simply benevolent, but a love of communion.
3.5. Spousal Love and the Love of Neighbour
Spousal love needs to be open to the neighbour not simply through the children, but also through the spouses directly. The spouses help each other to become a better person in society. On the other hand, the relationship with the neighbour has the potentiality to enrich the spouses and thereby their relationship. For example, good friendships or acts of charity contribute to the growth of the spouses and have a positive effect upon the relationship of the couple. In this perspective, social relations are neither optional nor intrusions
Conclusion
As an adequate response to the importance of the interpersonal relationship in marriage, theology has to emphasise the personal growth of the spouses, i.e., the realisation of one’s potentials, which is potentially fostered by and extended to various relationships in marriage. The doctrine of the Trinity may be helpful to bring out the growth-based interconnectedness of relationships.
Augustine Kallely
Individual response to any event of love, be it marital, work-place relationship, friendship, ethinic bond, or anything else, is always ambiguous. But, what is the source of ambiguity? divided interests of individuals or the nature of love itself? such were the classical approaches to the question of ambiguity (of love). Your paper deserves special admiration for identifying the ambiguities at the heart of marital-love-responses. You seem to approach the basic problem of ambiguity from another angle. As such, it is creative and praiseworthy. Reconceiving the marital love as a web of interconnected relations that contributes to the all-round growth of the individuals involved in the realtion is your solution to the problem. The merit of this answer is that it respects the freedom and future of all individuals, the value of the wisdom unique to the other branches of knowledge like, sociology, psychology, cultural anthropology, psyco-spiritual developmental studeis, etc. You have not sacrified your intellectual honesty by making any effort to disambiguate marital love. It is a marvelous acheivment.
ReplyDeleteNevertheless, I have some problems with an implicit presupposition of yours. Perhaps I may be reading my puzzling concerns to the back of your clear mind! Ignore my following question if it does not apply to your thought patterns. My problems is this: if ambiguity is the problem, then, will integrality be an answer? Will not be begging the question in positive terms? Will it not be an effort to reinstate the bright sides of the status quo? Can your model explain the execeptions in the field, say for instance, martial love between Moses and his wife, that between Gandhi and his wife, etc.? Well, theirs are not widely praised as successful marital lives. Yet, they are some instances for a case of marital love which is radically interrupted by completely altruistic and/or theological interests.
Your "Growth-Centred" approach to marital love surely helps wider and practical understanding of marital love. While I agree that such an approach to marital love clears some blocks in perception of marital love within the church/theology, it however seem to buy in some hurdles in return. Let me explain myself:
ReplyDeleteIf "Growth" (I think you tend to classify it as Personal Growth) is the dictum/focus of marital love, what happens, say, in a couple where there is no personal growth? Will you call the love between a couple who are not personally growing as "marital love"? Is the love between the couple who are not personally growing still meaningful within the context of the marital covenant? Then, do you propose that a couple that do not personally grow should divorce?
I feel that this "Growth-Centred" approach makes the marital love somewhat, so to say, "profit-oriented". I wonder how you would reconcile in your Growth-Centred approach, for example, "sacrificial love" of Christ for the church, as you propose Christ-Church relationship as a paradigm/model for the marital love? Does the "spirit of sacrifice" have any relevance to marital love in your proposed approach?
Further, "growth" is too ambiguous a term. How do you define growth? Isn't there a danger that growth can be defined too subjectively? How will a spouse evaluate if he/she is personally growing? How is the growth to be measured?
Look forward to further discussion during the session.
Joji