Is this Relationship a Mistake?

Apr 8 2005

Question:

I’m deeply in love with a woman and we’re planning to get married.  The only problem is we’re both already married and our spouses don’t know about our relationship.  They’ll probably be upset, but why shouldn’t we go ahead?  We are convinced God brought us together.

Billy Graham’s answer:

Let me be as direct as possible because you’re about to make a mistake that will never bring you the happiness you are seeking.  God did not bring you together (no matter what you feel), nor it is His will for you to break your marriage vows.  God never – never – tells us to do something that is contrary to His Word: and His Word is very clear: braking your marriage vows would be wrong.  Right now you are facing a major crossroad.  My prayer is that you both will turn from the path you are now on and recommit yourselves to your marriages. 

Jen’s response:

They’ll probably be upset?  Not probably, your respective spouses will be upset.  Where Graham goes wrong is not in strongly condemning your actions (he isn’t harsh enough on you for my taste).  Rather, where he errs is in saying you are about to break your wedding vows.  In my book, you already have.  As soon as you looked outside your marriage for companionship and sex, you broke your vows.  That you haven’t formally let your wife in on the fact that her marriage vows to you have been broken is due only to your cowardice.

 You can’t make what you have done right.  However, you can mitigate the damage you have caused by deciding that from here on out, you will become responsible for your actions and the consequences of your actions.  In short, now is the time to do the right thing.  First, you need to tell your wife immediately that you haven’t been faithful to her.  Then move out right away, do not prolong her agony by making her look at you on a daily basis.  If you have children, work with her as compassionately as possible to make sure the children are not affected by your infidelity any more then is absolutely necessary. They will be negatively affected by your selfishness because the stable home you were pretending to provide them isn’t actually all that stable.  Regardless, try not to make it any worse for them then it already is.  Leaving your wife will hurt her but it is much more compassionate then what you have been doing up to this point, lying to her and betraying her.  She deserves better then that and the nicest thing you could do is allow her to find someone who is honest, responsible and compassionate (which you have proven yourself incapable of by the way).   That means you getting out of her live as cleanly and quickly as possible.

 As for whether you should marry this new love.  Only you can answer that question.  But think about what kind of a deal are you making.  You are planning to enter into a new contract to love, cherish and be faithful to someone who has proven they are incapable of upholding such a contract.  For that matter, you too have proven that you are untrustworthy where such vows go.  This is going to sound harsh, but you are the sort of guy who cheats on his wife and lies to her about it.  Your new love is the sort of woman who cheats on her husband and lies about it.   You can protest this fact all you want, but the facts don’t lie.  You have obviously found a way to rationalize your bad behavior so I’ll leave you to it.  But, as far as I am concerned, if you want to believe the fantasy that neither of you are really the scumbags that you are, then you deserve each other.