The Principal of Subsidiarity In A Marriage

 

A few months ago I stumbled across a critique of Stephanie Gordon's (wife of Youtuber Tim Gordon, Rules For Retrogrades) book Ask Your Husband: A Catholic Guide To Femininity in Catholic World Report by Dr. Abigail Favale, PhD. I think the crux of the intense disagreement in the combox as to the merits of the article hinged on Gordon-supporters arguing that Catholic feminism is an irredeemable term that should be abandoned in favor of the patrimonial deference implied in the title of Ms. Gordon's book. 

Dr. Favale takes an orthodox but more nuanced approach that sees the value in the roots of authentic Catholic feminism to get at what it means to be a woman (and man). Granted, this approach takes a bit more reflection and thoughtfulness to keep the knee-jerk tendency to dismiss "triggering" words like feminism outright and consider the merits apart from the baggage. 

I have not read Ask Your Husband (apparently TAN pulled it after Timothy Gordon's brother David claimed Stephanie plagiarized sections of his own manuscript), so I can't speak to it's contents apart from the general premise. While I may be biased (I am not a Gordon fanboy, and have just settled on the conclusion that we all have our own particular styles of delivery), I did think Ms. Favale's article offered a balanced and fair critique. 

(I happened to stumble upon her Pints With Aquinas sit-down last night, and found her conversion to Catholicism interesting and authentic, her respect for nuance refreshing, and her recognition of the problems replete with feminism in the culture today honest and thoughtful. She is married to a Catholic convert and has four children).

What does any of this have to do with the Catholic principal of subsidiarity, especially as it pertains to marriage? In reflecting on the Gordons approach, which Ms. Favale claims is "legalistic and ideological," I felt there were some parallels worth exploring. 

In this context, we can see marriage as that social organization in which the human person is the principal, subject, and object. In this one-flesh union, husband and wife lay the building blocks of society through the generation of new life and the raising up of families. Even in the Sacrament of Matrimony this subsidiarity is respected in that the parties consenting to the union (the husband and wife) are themselves the ministers of the Sacrament. 

Subsidiarity is concerned mostly with economic systems and governments. With regards to the "higher orders" participation in that of the lower orders, "governments should not intervene to solve all problems":

"The government has many necessary and indispensable functions to play, roles that cannot be accomplished by individuals acting alone or even by smaller groups in society. Yet states and governments often exceed their legitimate role and infringe upon individuals and groups in society so as to dominate rather than to serve them."

The affairs of marriage are best handled at the lowest possible level, closest to the affected persons. There is a macro scope of vision (leading each other to Christ, how to live out one's vocation, etc), but the majority of marital decisions are those that take place in the day-to-day decisions spouses make. It would be unreasonable for a higher agency is this context to formulate top-down approaches to these kinds of decisions--a "micro-managing" if you will. 

Violations of the principal of subsidiarity decreases economy, efficiency, liberty and the personal character of the social order. This "personal character" of the social order (the marriage) depends upon a degree of liberty and leeway in discernment between the individuals as to the affairs of work, dress, charity, and child rearing at the lowest level. 

So, let's circle back--what does this have to do with the Gordons' book and their particular constitutions of "authentic Catholic femininity" and "the case of patriarchy" in more pragmatic terms? Well, my first reaction (again, based only on my viewing of Tim's channel and not having read the books, so take it for what it's worth) is that it is heavy-handed and a bit "top-down" in their proscriptions of what "real Catholic" men and women have to do and be in their particular roles that does not allow for the liberty and personal character of the social order referenced above. 

A healthy marriage (in my opinion) in the modern age builds from the bottom up on a (hopefully) firm, sacramental foundation. One lives within the vows, which come from above and are consented to. So there is a restriction there, but for the sake of liberty and the respect that comes with it. One pledges to be faithful--in sickness and health, for richer or poorer--but the spouses are not handed a set of blueprints of how to build the house of their marriage from a higher authority. They are not told how many children they are to have, how much to give to the Church in offering, how to school their children, where to live or how to live out their vocation in legalistic dictate. They are given that freedom to build and live in it as they see fit. 

I respect my wife enough not to dictate to her what she can and can't do. I certainly don't expect her to "ask me" for permission to leave the house or for any hundreds of minor decisions we have to make in the course of our days. I do expect her to consult with me for big financial decisions, or with things related to our children (schooling, friends, etc). But we do this in consultation with one another, not me making ultimatums. 

There is a lot of contention about "working women" in Catholic circles, which I choose not to wade into. Part of this is that my wife does work, albeit minimally and not in a way that interferes with family life or her primary vocation as a wife and mother. I have seen the struggles full-time working mothers go through, especially with regards to daycares and balancing everything, and I feel for them. I don't think it's ideal in any sense, though some do seem to pull it off. 

With regards to dress, my wife has common sense and a natural modesty that I don't interfere with much. Veiling is a good example of how one could "command" their wives to veil, citing Scripture or Church teaching. I have left it up to my wife, and she naturally took to it over time. But it wasn't by threats or shaming on my part. I think this is a better (and more respectful) way of approaching matters of modesty. 

When it comes to roles, I don't think my manhood is diminished by doing an occasional load of laundry or loading the dish washer. There was a time when my wife was working full time in which I was doing the majority of housework and daycare pickups, and that didn't work particularly well.  There was a degree of doing it for the sake of getting it done, but that it didn't fit my sense of role in the marriage. But again, this was on the lowest level of subsidiarity in which we lived out this way of delineation of duties and learned what worked and what didn't. It wasn't handed us from a higher authority in which we were mandated our duties. Like the "invisible hand" of capitalism, it worked itself out naturally over time when we brought things more in accord with a traditional model of duties. 

I could go on with other examples, but I think the point I'm trying to make here is that a healthy respect for freedom and dignity of spouses is not "effeminate" but more in line with authentic Catholic social teaching at the fundamental level of society--the family. I will admit it is a social overlay onto an economic and political model, and it may or may not work in this context. We're all trying to figure out how to live authentic Catholic lives in a confusing modern age. But to the degree that the case for patriarchy and authentic femininity is dictated from above by self-proclaimed "Catholic retrogrades" looking to restore the monarchy and abolish feminism in their spare time by writing books and doing podcasts, we may have to ask if the latitude and freedom of discernment the Church provides in these matters to individual couples is perhaps a better model to adopt. A principal of subsidiarity in marriage, if you will.