I am publishing this from my archives today because I’m taking the day off!
Dear God,
If Eric hears just one thing all year at Mass–from over 40 hours of Christian liturgy–it would be a clip from today’s readings (Colossians 3:12-21) on the Feast of the Holy Family: “Wives, be subordinate to your husbands, as is proper in the Lord.”
No offense, God, but every time I get to that part of the Bible, I think I’ve accidentally picked up the Qur’an. To save face, you go on with directions for the other members of a family:
Husbands, love your wives, and avoid any bitterness toward them (ESPECIALLY WHEN THEY AREN’T SUBORDINATE TO YOU). Children, obey your parents in everything (HA HA HA … that is a joke, right?) for this is pleasing to the Lord (AND TO THE PARENTS OF COURSE). Fathers, do not provoke your children, so they may not become discouraged. (MOMS ARE OFF THE HOOK! PROVOKE AWAY!)
Okay, so I’m having a little fun with the way you expect a family to work. The point You’re getting at (I think … as I don’t want to put any more words into your mouth than Scripture scholars already have) is that a family is a whole of lots of parts, kind of like that other passage in scripture (Romans 12:3-8):
For by the grace given me I say to every one of you: Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment, in accordance with the measure of faith God has given you. Just as each of us has one body with many members, and these members do not all have the same function, so in Christ we who are many form one body, and each member belongs to all the others. We have different gifts, according to the grace given us. If a man’s gift is prophesying, let him use it in proportion to his faith. If it is serving, let him serve; if it is teaching, let him teach; if it is encouraging, let him encourage; if it is contributing to the needs of others, let him give generously; if it is leadership, let him govern diligently; if it is showing mercy, let him do it cheerfully.
In our house, it looks a little like this:
Cooking (includes coffee in the morning): Eric
Dishes: Me
Cleaning/straightening up: Eric (because it doesn’t bother me as much as him)
Watering plants, feedings dogs, keeping everything alive that breathes: Eric
Changing light bulbs: Eric
Taking out trash: Eric
Catechesis (“Jesus is the reason for the season,” etc.): Me (and religious ed teachers)
David’s homework: Me
Almost everything else concerning David (we divided up the kids and each took one): Eric
Katherine and her umpteen messes and explosive outbursts (includes wiping, of course): Me
David and Katherine: praying before meals
Everything school related (parent-teacher conferences, fundraisers, cutting out a bunch of stupid dishes, dogs, detergent from “Family Circle” magazine for “D” day, finding something other than my cell phone and car keys for Show and Tell): Me
You know it works around here, God. We all feel like we’re pitching in more than the other, and yet we come up short, tired, and frustrated. We’re following your directions of dividing and conquering as best we know how, but the kids are winning 50 to 0, and while I can take this straight to a family psychologist (with whom I’m already working), I think the answer lies in the first part of Paul’s letter to the Colossians, the instructions that come before the “Wives, be subordinate to your husbands” part:
Brothers and sisters: Put on, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, heartfelt compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience, bearing with one another and forgiving one another, if one has a grievance against another; as the Lord has forgiven you, so must you also do. And over all these put on love, that is, the bond of perfection. And let the peace of Christ control your hearts, the peace into which you were also called in one body.
So right after we divvy up the tasks, and make our to-do lists, you tell us to rip up the job chart, and put compassion in front of every task. Which reminds me of the best marital advice I ever received. At a bridal shower for a friend of mine, we were all told to jot down one thing on a small index card that helps to sustain a marriage.
“Occasionally leave love notes for him under his pillow,” one woman wrote.
“Give him a backrub every now and then,” another suggested.
“Always eat dinner together,” a third recommended.
“Be nice to each other,” said a woman who had been married for over 40 years.
“Ah … duh???” I thought to myself. “There’s a woman who needs more chocolate in her life.”
But her advice stuck. Because it’s by far the hardest. When Eric walks through the door at 6:15 and I have just wiped Katherine for the fifth time in the last hour, and David is on his third meltdown because he hasn’t written his name perfectly on his sheet of homework, and they thought it would be really fun to build a fort out of all the sheets and bedspreads in the house while I called back my mom, I’m not wanting to paste on a smile as I run to hug Eric, saying, “Welcome home! Honey!”
But the seasoned woman is right. The best thing I can do for my marriage at that point is to rip up that list of chores in the back of my brain that has more jobs checked off from me than him, and to hug him, and tell him he matters to us, and that I realize his job isn’t a cakewalk either. It’s just involves cleaner, better-smelling, quieter tasks than mine.
But God, I prefer to say that if I am indeed able to act that way (I’m working on it), I would become a COMPASSIONATE wife, not a subordinate wife. Because, remember, we’re all equal in You (Galatians 3:28): “There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.”
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