"[Marriage] is a "contract" different from and more demanding than other important legal acts, such as the purchase of a property or an automobile, because of the moral and vocational consequences involved in it." Bianchi, P. G., & Miller, M. J. (2015). When Is marriage null?
Duties Of A Husband
It is the duty of the husband to treat his wife generously and honorably. It should not be forgotten that Eve was called by Adam his companion. The woman, he says, whom thou gavest me as a companion. Hence it was, according to the opinion of some of the holy Fathers, that she was formed not from the feet but from the side of man; as, on the other hand, she was not formed from his head, in order to give her to understand that it was not hers to command but to obey her husband.
The husband should also be constantly occupied in some honest pursuit with a view to provide necessaries for the support of his family and to avoid idleness, the root of almost every vice.
He is also to keep all his family in order, to correct their morals, and see that they faithfully discharge their duties.
Duties Of A Wife
On the other hand, the duties of a wife are thus summed up by the Prince of the Apostles: Let wives be subject to their husbands. that if any believe not the word, they may be won without the word by the conversation of the wives, considering your chaste conversation with fear. Let not their adorning be the outward plaiting of the hair, or the wearing of gold, or the putting on of apparel: but the hidden man of the heart in the incorruptibility of a quiet and meek spirit, which is rich in the sight of God. For after this manner heretofore the holy women also, who trusted in God, adorned themselves, being in subjection to their own husbands, as Sarah obeyed Abraham, calling hint lord.
To train their children in the practice of virtue and to pay particular attention to their domestic concerns should also be especial objects of their attention. The wife should love to remain at home, unless compelled by necessity to go out; and she should never presume to leave home without her husband's consent.
Again, and in this the conjugal union chiefly consists, let wives never forget that next to God they are to love their husbands, to esteem them above all others, yielding to them in all things not inconsistent with Christian piety, a willing and ready obedience.
"Taking into account the power of passion, the position of married people, bound to live together for the education of their children, would be unbearable, if they were under the obligation of restricting their relations solely to those occasions on which actual fecundation was possible. They must necessarily have recourse to constant relations — we mean, of course, lawful relations — as a necessary sedative ; and for that, we repeat, they must have a real right and a real obligation with respect to one another." p. 216
"As soon as one of the parties is in the requisite condition to make use of the right, and demands it, the other party is bound in justice to render the marriage debt. Apart from the case in which one of the parties demands this as a strict right, the law of charity may require that it should be tendered." p. 216
"Where one of the parties has full right and liberty to make use of the marriage, it may yet happen that the other party may have good and sufficient reason for refusing the marriage debt.
Practically these reasons resolve themselves into the following: from the conjugal relations would cause one of the parties a serious injury, or a notable inconvenience ; however, there is no question here of a physical danger so great that the very fact of its existence would render sexual intercourse unlawful. In order to judge of the validity of these grounds of exemption it is necessary to take into account the persons and the circumstances; thus a more serious reason would be required for an absolute refusal than for merely deferring or restricting one's compliance.
The wife's want of strength, for instance, may not be a sufficient reason for a categorical refusal, but may be enough to justify a delay, or less frequent intercourse. In like manner the drunken state of the husband, even though partial, seems quite a sufficient reason for the wife to defer rendering the marriage debt; for it must be painful to a self-respecting woman to give herself up to a drunken man, to say nothing of the possible consequences of this condition to the child, in the event of pregnancy.
A reason sufficient to justify an absolute refusal (so far as such reason does not suffice to make conjugal relations unlawful) is the danger of contracting a contagious malady, such as leprosy or syphilis. The same must be said of the special risks that some women incur, who know from experience, or from what the doctor has told them, that every confinement will mean for them the danger of death.
As regards ordinary risks, the train of hardships and annoyances inseparable from pregnancy and motherhood, affords no sufficient reason for refusal ; nor the number of children, nor the consequent material embarrassment, apart, perhaps, from the case where the household is threatened with dire and chronic want, and the husband has little or no care for the well-being of his family." p. 231-233
"3. Formerly reasons for exemption from the marriage debt were admitted only with the greatest difficulty. This severity is truly suggestive Thus the decretal of Alex. Ill, chap. 3, X, IV, 8, decrees : « That if one of the parties is stricken with leprosy, and nevertheless demands the rendering of the marriage debt, the healthy party must comply with the general precept of the Apostle, and satisfy the other party. There is no sufficient reason for exemption. See also ESMEIN, o. c, II, p. 13 s." p. 232 footnote
"1 . A wife is never bound in justice to render the marriage debt to a husband seeking intercourse that is onanistic in any way whatever. The reason is that, according to what we have said above, she has not yielded power over her body except for the purpose of sexual intercourse that is of itself apt for generation. 2. She is not allowed to render the marriage debt to a husband who solicits her to have intercourse with him condomistically, using the little cloth or wrapper; for that would be immediate participation in an act intrinsically evil, as being inordinate." p. 243
"The right that parents have, and the obligation that they are under duty of educating their children are deduced directly from the nature of marriage children and from the end proper to it, which is no other than the work of generation and education." p.248
"Conjugal cohabitation implies community of roof (consortium tecti), that is to say, community of table and of family life under the same roof, and this is cohabitation strictly so called. In addition to this it also includes community of bedchamber or of bed (consortium tori)." p.255
Handbook of Moral Theology
Dominic M. Prummer O.P, 1956, Mercier Press Limited
860. 2. THE OBLIGATION TO RENDER THE MARRIAGE DUES.
FIRST PRINCIPLE. As often as one of the parties asks reasonably and seriously for the rendering of the marriage dues, the other is bound in justice to accede to the request; otherwise grave sin is committed.
EXPLANATION. The request must be reasonable and serious. The request is unreasonable if made in a state of drunkenness, or when one of the parties is seriously ill, or if the request is too frequent or causes scandal to others, or if the act is accompanied by the practice of onanism. The request is not considered serious if made in the form of a desire rather than a definite will. But if the request is reasonable and serious, then the other party is obliged in justice to render the marriage debt under pain of grievous sin, as is evident a) from the words of St. Paul quoted above, and b) from the nature of the marriage contract in which the right to sexual intercourse is handed over from one party to the other. This obligation of rendering the marriage dues, although of its nature serious since it is concerned with a grave matter stipulated ill a just contract, does admit of parvity of matter. Thus, if the wife were to refuse marital relations once or twice, awaiting a time more suitable to herself, she would not be guilty of grave sin -- at least, if the husband is not thereby placed in proximate danger of incontinence or provoked to excessive anger. It is self-evident that there is no obligation to render these dues if one of the parties has forfeited the right to ask for them by reason of his or her adultery or as the result of severance of conjugal relations having been legitimately obtained.
861. SECOND PRINCIPLE. a) In itself there is no obligation to ask for the act proper to the married state, and therefore it is permissible for both parties by mutual free consent to abstain from the act either permanently or for a time; b) but incidentally, by reason of charity, there does exist on occasions such an obligation.
The reason justifying the first part of the principle is that both parties are free to renounce their right to sexual intercourse. Thus Our Lady and St. Joseph, although truly married, freely renounced their right of asking for the marriage dues, and at least temporary continence is usually beneficial in promoting the spiritual life of husband and wife. The reason for the second part of the principle is that the withholding of marital relations can be the cause of many evils, e.g. danger to chastity, a weakening of married love.
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