From Sanford Scandal to Christian Calamity

Last Updated on August 28, 2023

When then Sen. Mark Sanford attacked Bill Clinton at the height of the Monica Lewinsky affair, voting for his impeachment for lying about the affair and suggesting he should not be president, two funny things happened.

First, Sanford, intentionally or not, established himself as a sort of moral judge who could only be best served to make sure he kept his own activities above board. And second, he seems to have earned, among some Christians, a stack of free passes a mile high.

Earlier today, I adjusted my Facebook status message:

“Patrick is wondering why Sanford hasn’t resigned already.“

Nowhere in that simple sentence is there any religious overtone, no harsh judgment, or even a statement that I want him to resign. The only thing one could logically deduce from that sentence was that I was perhaps assuming that his resignation was imminent, and that I was curious as to why it hasn’t already happened. But to assume something might be imminent doesn’t necessarily mean that you believe it’s the right thing.

In my case, of course, I think it is the right thing. But I’ll get back to that in a moment.

My little status message was met by a few statements of agreement, and then was met with a bit of proscelytizing:

“We need to pray for him and his relationship with God. He who is without sin, please cast the first stone. Bible says we should hate the sin and love the sinner. I disagree with his actions, also, but no one sin is greater than the next, i.e. road rage is no different in God’s eyes. It’s easy to call someone else out for their wrongdoings than to pray for their wellbeing! Y’all have a great day, we all need help in some area or our lives.”

A few posts down, someone asked why he should lose his job because he cheated on his wife, adding that this was between him, his wife and God. Looking back at my little status message, I see no mention of his affair as the reason he should step down. And a few posts past that, someone added that “most people should look in the mirror.”

Funny how assumptions run so easily rampant when one tries to impart a little religious knowledge.

Towards the end of the discussion, before I chimed in with my mondo response, the poster who made the comment above thanked me for the status because it gave him an opportunity to “bring God into this for us.”

I’m happy to keep God in the discussion, but I’m frankly a little offended that anyone would make a blanket assumption that He was ever out of it based on my expecting Sanford to resign. Whether you like to admit it or not, that was a spiritual stone cast in my direction. Let’s not pretend otherwise.

But if we really want to get biblical, let’s go for it:

Jesus warned against casting the first stone to a group of people ready to stone a fallen woman for the sport of it. All caught up in the heat of a mob mentality, they were probably pretty happy that if someone was accused of a mortal sin, it was someone other than themselves.   At the very least, they’d forgotten she was a human being.

I’ve suffered no such failure of memory here. I’ve prayed for Mark Sanford. But then I’ve also prayed for Jenny Sanford and their children. Why are so many so quick to leave them out of this little “pray more” message? Don’t they deserve our concerns as well?   They’re far more the victims of this than he is.

The bible tells us to be compassionate for others rather than judging to establish ourselves as being better than anyone else.   We all know those “holier than thou” types.

But it also tells us that we as Christians have to make judgments to determine right from wrong; how else would we know which was which in our daily walk? Living a life that honors God is very often about making value judgments when specific things we face aren’t specifically covered in the bible. There were plenty of things Jesus himself never talked about from the records we have, leaving us to decide, based on our own personal walk with Him, whether He didn’t mention them because He didn’t feel they were as big of a problem as some of us make them out to be or because there were more important things He wanted us to focus on instead.

The bible tells us that governments are God-ordained. We, as Christians, have a moral responsibility to honor them, too.   Does this not include weeding out dishonesty and corruption in our God-ordained government?

I should point out, though I shouldn’t have to, that this does not mean voting for only those candidates who call themselves Republicans. A lot of Christians have a hard time believing otherwise. A lot of Christians have convenient cases of amnesia when it comes to the fact that one of the finest men ever to serve in the White House, one of the most moral, most religious, and most caring about others in need, happened to have been a Democrat named Jimmy Carter.

For the record, I don’t expect Sanford to resign because of an affair. I expect him to resign because he, as Governor, left the country without telling anyone, leaving his state — my state — with no one in charge.

Then there was the press conference, which, oddly enough, wasn’t arranged until after a reporter from The State newspaper surprised the governor at the airport as he returned to the U.S. At this press conference, Sanford said he was committed to rebuilding his relationship with his wife and kids. If that had been true, he wouldn’t have then told a reporter one week later that his mistress was his “soul mate” and sobbed about this “forbidden”  and “tragic” love story. You wouldn’t subject your wife to that kind of information, and you certainly wouldn’t subject your children to it.

Ever.

He also assured taxpayers that he didn’t use state funds — taxpayer dollars  — for his liasons. If that had been true, he wouldn’t have had to pay the state back for anything, yet he volunteered to pay for the cost of a trip to Argentina last summer during which he spent part of the time with his other woman.

Try taking money from a convenience store, walking up to a cop a year later, handing over the cash and saying you’re sorry, and tell me if the kindly police officer smiles and pats you on the head lovingly, or cuffs you and takes you to jail.

And let’s be realistic here: if someone accuses you of something you didn’t do, you don’t then pay the price when you know you’re innocent. Suppose that a woman approaches you and accuses you of stealing her laptop. You didn’t steal it. You know you didn’t steal it. You assure her that you’re not the one who took it. You don’t then turn around and buy her a brand new one just because you’re a nice guy. If you’re the exception to that rule, then you stole mine! I’ll take a new MacBook Pro, and let me know when you have it ready to ship.

Two days ago, South Carolina’s attorney general called for an investigation into Sanford’s travel records to make sure that no taxpayer dollars were spent. Sanford said he welcomed such a probe because it would prove, once and for all, that he had been honest. Just today, he backed down from that, and is now refusing to hand over his records.

UPDATE:   He has since changed his mind and has released his records publicly, after a SLED investigation found that he had not used public money for private travel.

How much should questionable behavior should we, as Christians, be willing to accept from someone who we’ve elected to lead our government? If we are supposed to hold each other accountable, does there not come a point at which we must demand that a man who is not demonstrating he can be trusted to live up to his word should step down?  Or are we to ignore anything anyone does and just bounce merrily along as long as the leader in question promises that he’s a Christian who’s bound and determined to get himself right with God?

What too many Christians seem unwilling to consider is the notion that one can pray for someone, have compassion for them, but still want them to step down and get their personal lives right.

One final point: for those who really want to keep this discussion biblical, then it’s not “most people” who should look in the mirror: it’s all of us. Let’s not lose sight of that, either.