Today’s first reading at Mass is the most un-PC in the New Testament (Eph 5:21-33), which, unfortunately, leads some clergy to avoid it out of lack of faith, lack of understanding, or cowardice. Yet, it offers a clear illustration of the beauty of the masculine-feminine relational dynamic, whose source is found the eternal relation between the Father and the Son and is whose paradigm is modeled in the relation between Christ and His Church.

The marriage of a man and woman is a reflection of this complementary dynamic, which St. Paul symbolizes as head and body and Pope Pius XI as head and heart: “For if the man is the head, the woman is the heart, and as he occupies the chief place in ruling, so she may and ought to claim for herself the chief place in love” (Casti Connubii, §27). No body – human, family, organizational, or political – has two heads and no heart or two hearts and no head. The interdependent relation between these vital elements is essential for life and well being.

Key words from St. Paul in this reading to distinguish between masculine and feminine forms of love are ‘cherish’ and ‘respect’: the man cherishes his wife as his own flesh and the woman respects her husband as her head. The modern world rejects this divine and human dynamic due to fear of it being abused, and the desire to be one’s own independent god.