One more bit on marriage/submission

This time from Christos Yannaras. (You see what I mean about the Greeky, literal translation.)

The going forth to reach out to life is the Church's mystery of marriage. A mystery, because it is grace that takes us by the hand, the giving of a reciprocal gift. The Lover takes us by the hand through a complete renunciation of every demand. And then the mode of the life given to us as a gift is tangible in the human marital relation. Mode of reciprocal gift, as made incarnate by the Guide who takes us by the hand: "Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the Church and gave himself up for her... Wives be subject to your husbands... as the Church is subject to Christ... This is a great mystery, and I mean in reference to Christ and the Church (Eph. 5:22-33.)

In the culture of a sensibility which values choices above everything, the mystery of a life-bearing death seems a paradox. Paul speaks and people laugh: "Let the wife see that she respects her husband" (Eph. 5:33.) The equality of the sexes is now taken for granted, the careful weighing of rights and responsibilities and duties, the reciprocal nature of every responsibility. We do not suspect that Paul seeks something greater: that relation in which the one party renounces itself without stint or measure and the other party makes itself subject to the renouncer with the fear and reverence this special gift generates. Who can demonstrate to blind eyes that somewhere in this mode of relation love becomes true and death is abolished?

Variations on the Song of Songs, pp. 123-124