Spiritual words

A woman’s duties towards her husband

    • Foto: Oana Nechifor

      Foto: Oana Nechifor

To maintain Christian piety in the house, to pray to God at night…

- To love her husband with a natural matrimonial duty, but also with the spiritual one of being true Christians, because their union was made out of love for life and they will be judged together by Christ;

 - To pray constantly to God asking for the wisdom, aid, strength of the faith, peace and health of her husband;

- Ask the priest regularly to pray for her spouse, children, relatives, friends and for the soothe of those who hate them;

- To obey her husband in those of the Christian faith and that are not against the commandments of God;

- To do not refuse her husband in the conjugal duties in the appointed days and force him to avoid conception;

- To do not accept immoral and disrespectful conjugal life, one that for a good Christian is prohibited;

- To do not accept to go with her husband to movies and worldly amusements, dancing at weddings and drunkenness, orgies both Sundays and holidays, if they want God to help them in life;

- To urge her husband to pray regularly, fast, give alms, to bodily restraint and to celebrate divine services, especially on Sunday;

- To urge her husband to confession at least four times a year and to fulfil the given spiritual canon;

- To stop her husband from swearing about the holy things, going to pubs and amusements, in courts and in meetings with evil people or gambling, facts that lead Christians to sin and draw upon them God’s wrath;

- To do not allow her husband to read bad books and magazines, pornography, crime, or sectarian, or bring them to their house; but only to read Orthodox books and those that build your soul;

- To do not quarrel with her husband nor to accuse him of bodily or spiritual sins, even if she hears bad things about him, but pray for him, following the advice gave by the spiritual father, for patience and her prayer  will the home and the peace of the family;

- To maintain Christian piety in the house, to pray to God at night, to prepare food for her husband, eat and worship togehther with her husband, to keep the house clean, speak little, avoid any dispute and regularly visit their godparents, parents and in-laws.

(Translated from Arhim. Ioanichie Bălan, Călăuză ortodoxă în familie și societate, II, Editura Mănăstirea Sihăstria, p. 54-55)