Philip Yancey, you're a crumb

Breaking, unsurprising news: Longtime bestselling Christian author Philip Yancey (76) has confessed to an 8-year affair with a married woman and is going to “withdraw from ministry.” Such a sacrifice for a 76-year-old man whose writing career began 55 years ago and whose books have sold more than 15 million copies (and continue to sell).

Oh, and he was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease in 2023 when he wrote about how the disease was slowly disabling him and that Janet, his wife of 55 years, was preparing for caretaking.

Philip is very “concerned” about protecting his lover and her husband and their families. And God. He’s going to spend his “remaining years” restoring his marriage and living up to the words in his books. You know, while his wife takes care of him.

Janet says she has been traumatized and devastated but made a sacred and binding marriage vow 55.5 years ago and won’t break that promise.

Here’s how I imagine Philip: “For 8 years I had my cake and ate it too and now there’s nothing left but crumbs but here, faithful wife, they’re all yours. But I’m not just giving you the crumbs, you’re going to have to clean them off of my face (and clothes and floor) every day for the rest of my life. I stole and stole and stole from you and have nothing left to repay you with. But God would definitely want you to forgive me and give me the grace I wrote and spoke about while I was fucking someone else’s wife.”

I’m so grateful (sarcasm) to my ex-husband who had the decency to wait to cheat on me for four years AFTER I’d been his post-heart attack (and subsequent panic attacks and anxiety) caregiver for three years (2011-2014)

We moved to Cambodia in 2015. He cheated from 2016-2020 (I didn’t know obviously), and we moved back to the US in March 2020. He left abruptly in September 2020, went back to Cambodia to be with his lover, then had health problems a few months later, dumped her, and returned to the U.S. but in a different state thank god where he can be someone else’s crumbs for his remaining years.

He stole so much from me over the course of our marriage, but I got to heal for the past five years without having to see his face, and I’m only 50 and have so many great years without him ahead of me. Janet gets to “heal” while she takes care of the person who harmed her. My anger at Philip is surpassed only by my sadness for her.

“Forgiveness” in the Christian world has been so cheapened. It’s literally a license to do whatever the hell you want for however the hell long you want and then say you’re sorry, demand forgiveness, and go on with your happy life unscathed.

It’s like the only unforgivable sin to them is not forgiving someone who committed any/all of the other sins against you.

I posted about this on Facebook last night and somehow a whole bunch of people I’m not even friends with found it. I blocked all the ones who said they were just so disappointed by the “unforgiving” comments toward Yancey. Bye.

Not feeling obligated to forgive people who aren’t actually sorry is one of my favorite parts of not being a Christian anymore. That and not sitting through boring sermons every Sunday morning.

I did read between the lines of Janet’s statement where she said, “God, grant me the grace to forgive also, despite my unfathomable trauma.” So she hasn’t forgiven him yet.

Allow me to offer a counter prayer: “God, don’t grant her that grace. Philip can take that grace and shove it. But please do help her heal from her unfathomable trauma. And please help her see that she doesn’t have to spend the rest of her life as a fulltime nurse to the man who traumatized her, because a loving God wouldn’t want that for her.”

Anyhoo, here’s to more shitty men paying actual consequences and reparations for their deeds in 2026 and beyond. In marriages, in churches, in governments, in everywhere. Amen.