I like it I think

 

I like it I think





     Part of the repressed education we received in Catholic school was our Senior year Religion class ironically called "marriage" taught by Father Cleary. The good father was a nice man and good to we boys but a priest teaching how to be married?! This was from the same high school that removed the chapter on Human Reproduction from the Physiology textbook in that same year. The smutty chapter had saucy reproductions of fallopian tubes and epididymis in the plural. The topper was the textbook "Cana Is Forever" that spelled out how we were to live chaste Catholic lives and conduct "the marriage act" with our spouses. Father Charles Hugo Doyle was the author and I have my Image Book edition dated 1947. Yes, we were given relationship advice from a book published before people even watched TV. "Counsels for Before and After Marriage" had a solidly patriarchal view of living in marital bliss that is truly hilarious in hindsight. It does start with the basics as the first chapter queries "what is this thing called love?" It goes on to be exactly what it claims to be "a Catholic guide to dating, courtship and marriage." Such good advice as St. Basil, in the third century, wrote: "Though the husband be harsh and savage in temper, the wife must bear with him and on no pretext seek to sever the union." Cana was reprinted repeatedly and even used in Richard Sheehy's catholic instruction in the 1970's. In 1972 boys were being told to avoid girls who listened to soap operas on the radio too frequently. Yet, the part Greg and I loved most were the descriptions of the differences between men and women that made marriage a challenge. As a man we were told to be totally in charge of the household while mama had kids and kept the place clean.  Doyle even provides a psychological profile:

1. Women are intuitive Men are intellectual

2. Women are identificationalists Men are realists ("It's an adorable dress, AngelaI had one just like it when I was your age.) ("What mileage can you get per gallon?")

3. Women are subjective Men are objective ("I like it--I think") ("He's O.K.--he is a good guy.")

4. Women go by inner perception Men go by rationalization ("I don't know why--but I just do ("Do you have any figures on that?") 5. Women are more indulgent Men are more influenced by in fancy facts. (That is why there are so (No comment.) many soap operas on the radio these days.)

The final words from Doyle : Verily, Cana Is Forever.



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