I am a 19 year old art student who was born Catholic and is currently a practicing Christian. I, like (it seems), Mrs. Sanford, tend to practice my faith independently. When I was going through a time in my life where I was borderline atheist, I know that anyone who brought up Christianity or attempted to get me to "see the light of Christ" would make me even more repulsed by the notion. I now know that is important to remain firm in your beliefs and yet accept others for who what they believe, allowing them to find their own way and offering help if they ask for it. Mrs. Sanford sounds like a fabulous wife/mother/friend/person in general. She is truly a great example for us all. Inner strength & forgiveness in the face of such a devastating heart break are hard things to muster up... there is no doubt in my mind that her strength comes from a good relationship with God.

I feel sad that so many people are critical of Jenny's comments (and her friend's comments) in this article. Surely you must realize that things that appear in print are often taken out of context. Also, I think it's great that she has chosen to let her life be a testimony that woos others (instead of pushing her faith on others by being verbose --- what a turn off that is, and not at all what God intended). As our pastor shared last year, we earn the right to share Christ with someone by letting the Holy Spirit woo them through us. And the Holy Spirit can only do that if we are willing to be in relationship with others who so desperately need to accept Him. How silly, then, that it was noted that she has a liberal friend, as if that was questionable! We should all have friends whose beliefs differ from ours. If we all stay in our comfortable little Christian box, God will have little chance to reach the lost! Jenny Sanford has shown tremendous grace and courage in the midst of a horrific situation, and the fact that she is able to share her story through non-Christian media outlets is a wonderful opportunity to reach women who so desperately need Jesus at this time. I will be praying for her and wish her well!

She is a Gorgeous, Gorgeous Lady !! She is blessed in so many ways. She is a refreshingly articulate and intelligent. We pray to our Lord that her good friends will support her to find happiness. She has a beautiful smile. She needs to be happy again. We pray Lord, to stand with her and her young boys. Beautiful lady, pray she finds her lovely smile once more.

I am late coming into this discussion very late, however, it is Christmas and I was trying to see what the Sanford family would be doing. I've read most of the commentary from women and I have to say, save for the comments from the Christians on the board regarding Mrs. Sanfords not bringign up God in her day to day conversations with close friends, I found views interesting save for MaryAnn's. Mary Ann sounds like a loony tune. Ms. Chapur does not shoulder the total blame nor does Governor SAnford, however, Mr. Sanford feel short of his marriage vows and made a decision. There is blame to be had by Mrs. Sanford as well. You women just aren't clued in to it. Whatever Ms. Chapur did or did not do, I do think she is exordinarily beautiful in a very natural way. It is racism that persist here with women of color. AS this is S.C. the same exotic descriptions or expectations of how Ms. Chapur would look, hot, blah, blah, blah, are all couched in racist ways. Women of color are not all hot sirens waiting to snage innocent husbands out of their lairs. We women of color are intelligent, strong, intellectually gifted, as you white women and yes, we attract men of opposite races all the time. So I found MaryAnn's comments to be particularly distasteful towards Ms. Chapur, and yes MaryAnn you do sound extremely bitter. I don't know what the future holds for botht he Governor and Ms. Chapur, but I think taht Ms. Chapur has shown the most dignity, whilest the First Lady, and I completely understand her pain, has shown the "least." She has paraded in front of the cameras since the story broke, when all along she knew about the affair. For political expediency and to further her political ambitions and that of her husbands, she was willing to work with him on exocising this woman from her husbands loins and brain in order to keep the status quo. To me that does not make her any less pitiful or pathetic than the other political wives that she has been compared to and come out the victor. She is just as controlling as any of them were, the least to me was Ms. Spitzer, I do like her. When the Governor disobeyed her command, that's when she went ballistic and orghestrated his downfall. The press conference we became aware of was in June, ok. For something this tramatic to hit a marriage, I would think you would need more than six months to work towards reconcilaition through forgiveness as the Mrs. has sprouted. I would think it would take at least a year. Separate, go to counseling work with your children so on. It seems all Mrs. Sanford has done is trademark her name, write her memorirs give interview after interview to countless upscale magazines and news broadcast outlets and now six months later she is filing for divorce, Wow! Even I can't catch my breath! When has she had any time to really work toward reconciliation as she has stated and given it time to actually work?...Or I forgot, she used to be a corporate raider, pretty much like the ones, who are were orghestrating the downfall of the American economy and they were like little worker bees weren't they? So all Jenny Sanford as really done, is written him off, which is her perogative to do and work like a little worker bee towards her own agenda while she sweetly in the most southernest of ways...destroys her husband. What say you MaryAnn?

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I recently found out my husband had an affair, due to getting a pap smear and coming down with a std. The woman Estella Garza, new my husband was married, and though him and I had only been apart 3 weeks, moved him in and had sex with him. I have been trying very hard to forgive and move on but I am finding it extremely hard. Although I am currently living with my husband, I think deep down there is no changing him. I have to make a decision by 10/1, on wether I try to save my marriage or let him go. I harbor a large amount of animosity toward Estella as well, this situation consumes me night and day. The reason this situation is so hard for me is because, Im on my fourth set of antibiotics- to rid me of the std i cought from sleeping with my husband on reconciliation. I feel as if him and his mistress have gotten off scott free. please pray for my mind to find peace, and realize i am a child of god and deserve so much better. please give me strenght to go through my divorce, or realize if my marriage is worth saving. Please pray that Estella garza in new braunfels tx will stop destroying peoples lives and marriages. and last but not least if my husband is not sincere pray that my transition out of this marriage wont be the worst thing in the world.

Jenny Sanford is handling her husband's unfaithfulness with an incredible amount of grace, and we should be slow to criticize. In her public comments so far, she has refused to cast judgment in any way on her husband or even on the woman he had an affair with, leaving the right to judge in the hands of God - the only One to whom that right truly belongs. This kind of restraint is something Scripture commands Christ's followers to do! Yet how many of us can honestly say that we would be able to do the same if we were in her position? In "This Momentary Marriage," John Piper writes: "The meaning of marriage is the display of the covenant-keeping love between Christ and his people." Through this covenant-keeping love, Christ has stayed with a people who have often been unfaithful ... and we ourselves are those people. According to Scripture, God does allow divorce when one's spouse is unfaithful - and if Jenny Sanford chooses to go this route, I doubt anyone would blame her. But what great testimony is it to a divorce-ridden, skeptical, nonbelieving world when a Christian publicly offers forgiveness to an adulterous spouse and refuses to condemn him? After reading her public response to the affair, I have a great deal of admiration for Jenny Sanford.

Jenny Sanford is handling her husband's unfaithfulness with an incredible amount of grace, and we should be slow to criticize. In her public comments so far, she has refused to cast judgment in any way on her husband or even on the woman he had an affair with, leaving the right to judge in the hands of God - the only One to whom that right truly belongs. This kind of restraint is something Scripture commands Christ's followers to do! Yet how many of us can honestly say that we would be able to do the same if we were in her position? In "This Momentary Marriage," John Piper writes: "The meaning of marriage is the display of the covenant-keeping love between Christ and his people." Through this covenant-keeping love, Christ has stayed with a people who have often been unfaithful ... and we ourselves are those people. According to Scripture, God does allow divorce when one's spouse is unfaithful - and if Jenny Sanford chooses to go this route, I doubt anyone would blame her. But what great testimony is it to a divorce-ridden, skeptical, nonbelieving world when a Christian publicly offers forgiveness to an adulterous spouse and refuses to condemn him? After reading her public response to the affair, I have a great deal of admiration for Jenny Sanford.

I do not believe that the statement “You could be friends with her for 20 years, and she would never bring up the religious stuff,” says her friend ... is as trivial as some are trying to make it appear. With all due respect to those who see it differently, I believe that sharing one's faith in Christ is an indispensable, non-negotiable aspect of being a believer in and a follower of Christ. I do not intend to "preach", but I must say that the same Jesus whom Ms. Sanford believes in and follows, makes it very clear that "no one can come to the Father except through me". Of course, there is a time and a place for everything, and there also is a right and a wrong way to do something. However, taking for granted that the "christian stuff" under consideration is the stuff regarding "righteousness, self-control and the judgement to come", twenty years seems an extraordinarily long time not to share the "good news" with a "friend". And what's the use of calling someone your "friend" if you cannot share the most important aspect of your life with them without their taking offence? In this regard, and meaning no offence to Ms. Sanford, I must honestly say that I feel as sorry for her as a christian being unable to share about the most important person in her life with a friend of twenty years, as I feel sadness over her marital situation. It hurts when someone you love and trusted has been unfaithful to you. I want to end by saying to all the believers in Christ who have contributed to this discussion, that sharing our faith in Jesus Christ is not optional nor open to debate. The word witness comes from a word which means to give one's life for the faith (martyr). I am not to deliberately chase my friends away with the gospel, but I must find a way to share my christian faith with my friends even if it means risking driving them away. I have a responsibility to Christ, and to my friends to share the gospel with them. I have often found that after the trepidation and fear associated with whether or not to share Christ with a friend, I am usually amazed at how positively they respond. In fact, one or two of my friends have asked what took me so long!

Everyone is upset over the, "The statement, "“You could be friends with her for 20 years, and she would never bring up the religious stuff,” says her friend Marjory Wentworth"" statement. Perhaps Jenny Sanford expresses her love for Jesus and her Christianity through her kindness and acts of service rather than her mouth. And perhaps that is why she has managed to maintain a friendship with someone fairly liberal instead of building a fence between them by constantly trying to convert them.