Calling to tweak marital roles: can anyone relate?
I'm an older GenX Catholic woman married to a Catholic older GenX man. About the time I started back covering a weekly adoration hour at my parish, I started a faith journey with the question--can I be both a Catholic wife and a feminist and it so--what would that look like? I'll start with where I am and my questions for the group and put some background at the end for those who need it.
I read the St. Paul hit parade on marriage, St. John Paul II's writings on Theology of the Body, women and marriage as well as Catholic/Christian marriage commentators from across the spectrum. Stripping things down to how I feel as a women, St. John Paul's theology spoke to me. I like that hubby and I are equal partners but as woman and man we love each other in a wonderfully different way.
I love being a woman and I love my (non-toxic) masculine man. I find beauty in Ephesians 5:21+ love partnership and even 1 Corinthians 11 when I read them with a modern lens. For example, with headship, I have no issue with my husband being my man and protector and me trusting and respecting my husband more. However, the traditional head of household model is just not us.
Through this I've felt a call to veiling, and I wear veils to mass and adoration. To the extent that I in the image of God am the glory of my man, that's fine. He's awesome.
I do wish that he would take more of a leadership role in our family partnership. He is an Ephesians man, but he's also used to be being strong and I do a lot of day-to-day leading. I'm tired. I talked with him about it and he's willing but I can tell that he doesn't know where to start.
My questions: Has anyone else gone on a similar faith journey or faced similar issues?Any advice or any good resources for helping us navigate this?
Thank you. Here's our background for those who want it:
I have feminist leanings and was raised by awesome devout Catholic parents--an accomplished rural church lady mother with feminist leanings but believed in lipstick and big hair and a Texan dad who loved her fiercely from the day he met her to the day she died. I was lucky to find a guy like my dad when I was in my late 20s and we've been married over 25 years. We are true partners and he's not one of those guys who wants to make me small so he can be a big man. We both work and had MIL help with the kids when they were young. I have no complaints over the division of labor, etc. Over the years, I've worked on being less bossy and he has worked on taking on more planning roles. Neither of us have any desire to fuction in the rad trad lifestyle.