If you are the spouse who usually wants intimacy more often, you may carry a quiet loneliness. You may feel unwanted, unattractive or even rejected as a person. Those feelings are real and deserve compassion. Your desire for your spouse is not a fault. The Church calls the marital union noble and honorable (CCC 2362). The question is not whether your desire is good, but how to carry it in a way that is loving.
Desire is not a debt to be collected
Saint Paul writes that husband and wife should give each other what is due, and that neither has authority over their own body alone (1 Corinthians 7:3-5). Some read this as permission to demand. But the passage is strictly mutual, and it sits within a vision of love that "does not insist on its own way" (1 Corinthians 13:5). Saint Paul VI taught that a conjugal act imposed on a spouse without regard for their condition and legitimate wishes is not a true act of love (Humanae Vitae 13). Intimacy given under pressure loses the very thing you are longing for: the free gift of your spouse.
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Sources
- CCC 2337-2339 Catechism of the Catholic Church, The vocation to chastity and self mastery
- CCC 2342 Catechism of the Catholic Church, Chastity as a work of a lifetime
- CCC 2354 Catechism of the Catholic Church, Pornography
- Humanae Vitae 13 Humanae Vitae, Paul VI, Faithfulness to God's design
- 1 Corinthians 7:3-5 The mutual gift of husband and wife
- Gaudium et Spes 49 Gaudium et Spes, Second Vatican Council, Conjugal love