As the Church, So Let Wives; As Christ, So Husbands

I found an archive of Amanda blogs from my old myspace from years ago, but thought it would be fun to share one here. Many are from my semester studying abroad and has too much personal information to be sharing on the internet. But this one, I think, is one that may be worth sharing:


April 19, 2006

I spent alot of time today contemplating why so many girls don't respect themselves and allow themselves to be disrespected in relationships. I started thinking while watching Dr. Phil (I know, but I was bored!), but then I moved on into deaper reasons. Why? Girls, why do you lack self-confidence and self-worth? Why do you desire to feel loved so much that you're willing to do anything to get that counterfeit? Why do you settle for what our world tells us "love is" and lower the beaty of sex to a simple act of self gratification? Why does a guy have to want you physically for you to feel beautiful? Is it because you were abused (as 1/3 to 1/2 of women are)? Why do women look for what they think is "love" in all the wrong places and settle for the counterfeit of true love?

I continue my thought into my study of John Paul II's Theology of the Body. What an amazing man JPII the Great was! Women, we're not meant to be in these situations! Men are supposed to love us, not dominate us! And we're meant to love and protect them in return! Not use our bodies and manipulate their weaknesses! Christopher West, in his study of JPII's T.O.B., looks at the verse from Eph. 5 and breaks up the word submission:Sub means under; mission means you are sent with authority to perform a particular service. St. Paul is calling the wife to put herself under the mission of the husband. The mission of the husband is layed out in the next verse: Husbands love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her (Eph. 5:25). Christ came into the world not to be served but to serve and to lay down His life for His bride. In this passage, St. Paul means to tell women to allow their husbands to serve them. The love to which St Paul calls husbands clearly excludes every kind of subjection whereby the wife might become a servant or a slave of the husband, an object of unilateral domination. Love makes the husband simultaneously subject to the wife and thereby to the Lord Himself, just as the wife to the husband (Thelology of the Body).the Husband is above all he who loves, and the wife, on the other hand is she who is loved. John Paul then concludes that the wifes submission to her husband, understood in the context of the entire passage. . ., signifies above all the experience of love.

Girls, we shouldn't be settling for the counterfeit! We should respect ourselves. We're not sexual objects and our bodies are beautiful temples of God! We shouldn't desecrate this temple, nor the bodies of men! You, as a woman, are BEAUTIFUL! You are worth more than this counterfeit love! Don't treat your body with disrespect, and don't allow anyone else to either. You ARE Loved! By your holy Father and Jesus Christ! You don't need to be in a relationship (especially one of counterfeit love) to be loved or beautiful.

Please, repsect yourself, demand respect for yourself, and never settle for the counterfeit! Turn to the love of Jesus Christ who died for you, and never settle for less than a man that fits Ephesians 5! One who will love you as Christ loved the Church; who gave himself up for her . . . that she might be holy and without blemish." THAT'S not a counterfeit!