Sabbath wrote:
I get what you are saying, but since there is no confusion on this issue, why is it so important to change it?
It a part of the larger picture, a key component in muddying of the waters.
Here some possible items:
Concupiscence is generally not considered as well as the desire for the other in the martial act, even if not sinful. There is probably a lot of couples who are under concupiscence, or rather, they have not yet overcome this. If there is a total self-gift then where does physical desire or even the provocation of the lower passion fall into this? It does not seem feasible to be a “total self-gift” if there is a component of physical desire; e.g. the husband, while wishing pleasure for his wife, in the context of being open to life, simultaneously desires to obtain pleasure of the act as well. This is not a total self-gift as there is always an element of desire. Part of the secondary purpose of marriage (or sometimes the tetrarchy purpose) is the relief of concupiscence. Unless there is some kind of evidence that the majority of couples in a sacramental marriage never have a wish for sexual pleasure for themselves, I am not sure how “total self-gift” makes much sense. Result: there is less talk about the relief of concupiscence as a proper end of marriage.
Further, it can sometimes be derived from recent documents that the primary goal of the family is procreation, albeit its sometimes ambiguous. This truth of this has deteriorated over the course of the last half century, this is due in part to the mudding of waters, but I would also say due to the over personalization of the conjugal act. The “total self-gift” is paralleled with Christ’s total-self-sacrifice on the cross. The couple, therefore, in giving themselves “total” in a personal and physical sense are told they achieve a level of love and intimacy that reflects sacrificial agape love to its highest decree, e.g. the loss of life. This point is pushed rather hard, and the wonderful effects of the primary end, procreation, are unintentionally moved to the backburner.
Conjugal love then becomes the all-encompassing reason for marriage. And within this all-encompassing reason procreation is deemed to be “fundamental,” “the crown,” or “the fruit.” Whereas, in Catholic teaching, procreation is primary and conjugal love and mutual help of the spouse is secondary and is subject to procreation, i.e. conjugal love serves procreation. Present day books, talks, lectures, articles, etc. on marriage appear to be about man and women, joined together, self-gift etc. Procreation, the primary end, is relegated to a status of lesser importance, equal value, or the most important aspect in serving conjugal love as being it's main fruit. Everything is now built about a foundation of total self-gift of conjugal love. From there, everything else is linked to it, including procreation. This is upside down. Marriage should be built upon the foundation of procreation, where conjugal loves serves procreation as subordinate to it.
There is also the error of “mutual submission” between husband and wife. Total self-gift would entail the entire personal and physical aspects of the person. Hence, the argument for the mutual submission of husband and wife, since they give themselves to each other in total. This is false, as the wife is submissive to the husband and the husband has authority over his wife. Total self-gift would entail the husband submitting to the wife also – but that is not possible because of the natural order. Hence, this may be why several key figures who promote “total self-gift” also hold to the error of “mutual submission.”