I do not work for Word Records but if they have a position to offer that would be a positive utilization of my hard-earned credentials, enchanting personality and naturally wavy hair -as well as provide fairly decent health and retirement benefits with a large Christmas turkey or ham (my choice) thrown in for good measure- I would happily consider it.

After reading your latest two posts bearing both a strong likeness to your others and a direct genetic link with multi-colored paint splatter, the ovewhelming theme is your anger. I suspect it merely hints at an even greater rage whose origins and developments are now, sadly, the embodiment of your life. To this I have no answer except to say I am sorry you have suffered. I am sorry you suffer still. And I am sorry that neither reason, biblical literacy, compassion, other human beings from various cultures and situations in life taking th time to interact and communicate with you (at the very least, tolerate your uninvited hostility,) has thus far, not alleviated your pain. It saddens me to know that the severity you wish to impose on others (as evidenced by your assault on Amy Grant) is the same cold and unforgiving sword you yourself will live and die by as it culminates into a desolate, despairing, loveless, inhuman and even Godless existence where everyone and everything you hold dear inevitably fails and abandons you.

Beyond that, you present only a ruthless hypocrisy in your two-dimensional view of God, scripture, the world, marriage, ministry, women, the music business, online etiquette and current events which, regrettably, eliminates any possibility for extended discourse. I believe under most forum guidelines, you'd be easily pegged as a "troll," and unwelcome under any circumstances but of course you are already aware of that, choosing instead to disregard such norms. As, by your own admission, you aren't here for friends, I presume this is of no consequence to you whatsoever.

For ridiculing your initial posts with a *yawn,* and for suggesting you be "whacked" in the head with the Letter of James, I really should apologize. As much as I would like to be always courteous, respectful, and kind even when faced with ideas that are unforgivably dumb, mean or simply packaged poorly, sometimes I don't manage it. For being disrespectful of you as evidenced by my thoughtless sarcasm, I am truly sorry.

Whoever you are, I will pray for you and hope in the years to come your life reaches a happier destination, earthly or otherwise than where it appears to be currently directed. Other than suggesting -with more courtesy this time- you do some extended reading and meditation in the Letter of James, remove words and phrases like "BS, frickin' and "screw that" from your everyday use of the English language and never, ever, under any circumstances pursue a position on a debate team, I have nothing further to say.

guest 7, I'm sure glad you aren't GOD. My God is loving, caring and compassionate, things you seem to lack. He is the God of second chances. I'm so glad he's given Amy, and Kim, and Sandy, and Michael English and all the others a second chance. I'm so glad there are people who are willing to continue supporting them inspite of their failures.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: tanyabell,

Tanya,

You are completely missing the point. This isn't about something personal so much as it is about something that comes from a professional level, and it isn't so much about me, but, far more imporantly, the Christian community as a whole.


Christianity Today, February 7, 2000

Take a Little Time Out
Amy Grant's ever-smiling face is everywhere, obscuring the tragedy of two failed marriages.

By Wendy Murray Zoba | I hear a dissonance in what I call "the Amy Grant situation." I open my copy of TODAY'S CHRISTIAN WOMAN and there she is on the inside back cover, captured in a moment of hilarity sitting cozily in front of a fireplace, selling us her latest Christmas CD. I open MARRIAGE PARTNERSHIP magazine ("marriage"/"partnership"—get it?) and there she is on the inside front cover promoting her Christmas tour. I open a catalog from a Christian retail chain, and there she is again—ever smiling, ever promoted.

The Chicago Tribune (Dec. 11) described the "Amy Grant Christmas" tour as "a wonderland of religious carols … and a heaping portion of vintage schmaltz."

These images trouble me. The recent news stories about the breakup of Grant's 16-year marriage to Gary Chapman coupled with the stories about her new (but long-suspected) boyfriend, Vince Gill, whose 17-year marriage ended in 1997, should give us all pause. But neither Grant nor the Christian marketing industry, in promoting her concerts and albums, has missed a beat.

There was no adultery that caused the breakup of the marriages, she assures us. By adultery she means sexual contact. There were, it seems, other intimate exchanges between Grant and Gill sufficient to bring down the Gills' marriage. According to People (Nov. 29, 1999), Gill's wife Janis found a note—"I love you, Amy"—in her husband's golf bag. (Through an assistant, Grant declined my two requests for an interview that could provide any missing context.) "That was the beginning of the end," says Janis Gill's sister, Kristine Arnold. The Gills divorced two years before the Grant/Chapman separation and divorce.

The problem with this situation is that no biblical category tells us how CCM artists function in the kingdom. Are they "ministers"? "Prophets"? "Teachers"? "Evangelists"?

If nothing else, they are public communicators who knowingly and willingly bear Christ's name in their very public ministries. They wield influence over their followers and have accepted and benefited from this visible mantle. They lead. They inspire. They "pump up." Sometimes they stumble.

We cannot begrudge them their humanness. Grant says in CCM magazine: "Go look in a mirror and everything that's black and ugly about you, it's the same about me. That's what Jesus died for."

Amen. Apparently she has worked through the faith issues, but it seems that neither she nor the evangelical community has reckoned with the issue of public ministry. "If I were a business executive and had an affair, my job would be safe," my husband (a pastor) once said. "As a pastor, I'd lose my job." A higher moral standard applies to those who lead and influence in Christ's name, regardless of their office.

Grant says in CCM that a counselor told her, "[God] didn't create this institution [of marriage] so He could just plug people into it. He provided this so that people could enjoy each other to the fullest." Grant herself adds: "[I]f you have two people that are not thriving healthily in a situation, I say remove the marriage. Let them heal."

If that is what Grant's counselor told her, then she got bad advice. Anyone who has persevered in marriage will attest that in deed there are moments of "enjoying to the fullest," but that often attends many tedious, sometimes painful, stretches. The best premarital advice I received came from our pastor's wife: "There are going to be times when you'll hate each other's guts." Those moments have been few and far between, but when they have occurred, my husband and I recognized this was normal and would pass.

The apostle Paul says that marriage represents, in earthly relationships, the mystical bond between Christ and his church. It is "a profound mystery" (Eph. 5:32). And the Lord knows the bond between Christ and his church, played out in real lives, can get messy. Should we "remove the marriage"?

Divorce happens—too often and not always for the right reasons. It is grievous and frequently carries ongoing destructive repercussions. It is something the Christian community should hesitate to gloss over. Rather than Amy Grant telling her (mostly Christian) audience, including youth groups, that she is looking for a date for New Year's Eve as her way of acknowledging her new circumstances, it would be appropriate if she, and we, took a time out. Those smiles, the pictures in glossy Christian magazines, and the shimmering gowns can fool us into forgetting the wreckage. Two families have been torn apart against their wills.

Whether Amy Grant and Vince Gill have found happiness amid the pain of others is a matter between them and their families, their church communities, and the Lord. But her dressing up and our propelling her public ministry, without taking time for serious reflection, violates what should be the Christian conviction about the sanctity of marriage.

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The Tennessean
April 20, 2003
Beverly Keel


Nearly five years after divorcing Vince Gill, Janis Cummins is putting her life back together. She's writing again, reuniting with sister and Sweethearts of the Rodeo partner Kristine Arnold, and is happily married. She says she's telling her story now, after years of silence, because no one had asked before.
On this recent afternoon, Janis Cummings shuffles around her house in fuzzy slippers and a black warm-up suit. She's taken a respite from the barn duties that usually fill the days at Southern Trace, her 21-acre Leiper's Fork farm.

The 8,500-square-foot house is quiet. No cars pass by, and if they did, they couldn't be heard inside anyway. There's no noise from TVs, radios or ringing phones, no voices of distraction, just peace and calm.

Cummings, 49, joyfully toils in what feels like obscurity as she dedicates herself to showing horses. But she's actually well known because of her previous identities as half of two famous partnerships.

She first gained fame as half of the sister duo Sweethearts of the Rodeo. Later she married country singer Vince Gill, whose massive success propelled them to first-name status within social and music circles.

For decades, she was the quiet partner. Onstage, she sang backup harmonies to her sister's lead; offstage, she stood in the shadow of her husband's spotlight.

Then everything changed as rumors about her husband's relationship with Christian/ pop singer Amy Grant ran rampant. They soon were followed by one of the city's highest-profile divorces, a excruciatingly hurtful event that cost her friends, business and social standing.

The ice princess

Largely due to chiseled cheekbones and a regal nose, Cummings unknowingly projected the image of a haughty, arrogant ice princess.

''I had so many people ask me when I first met her, 'Is she a b….?''' says her husband, Roy. ''She's the most unconditionally loving person I've ever met. It's just that quietness and look she has. She's a very misunderstood person in this community.''

Cummings is the first to admit she's not talkative to strangers but says it's because she's shy, not condescending.

''I'm terrified to be one-on-one with people at first,'' she says. ''A long time ago, somebody that I loved very much told me that people didn't like me. I went and looked at myself in a mirror and thought, 'OK, people don't like you.' I believed that with all my heart.

''The bad thing is, I spent so many years believing that I must put people off somehow and it made me back off even more. Now, I'm finding out that people will like me if they just give me a chance. I really want people to like me very much.''

It's a desire born of loneliness and pain.

During the breakup of her marriage, in addition to dealing with the staggering humiliation of being blindsided with such a public rejection, she faced a music industry town that quickly and solidly sided with her husband.

''He was the bigger of the two of us by far,'' Janis says. ''On top of that, you have a man who was doing some charity event every week. If you looked up 'nice guy' in the dictionary, Vince's face might be there, according to what he's done in this town.''

Yet Janis was missing from those charity events.

''I was not invited to be a part of those,'' she says. ''I would have taken a lot of joy in doing that. A lot of people thought, 'He tried so hard to help people. Where was she?' Half of the time I never knew those events took place until I read about them after the fact.''

Adds her attorney, Rose Palermo, ''It's hard getting divorced from someone who has the persona as Mr. Nice Guy. People assume it was something she'd done, without knowing the facts. She really had no interest in ruining him. She has a genuine gentility and niceness to her and it's very painful for her to have to do anything that would inflict any harm on anyone.''

Janis felt that she didn't have a friend in town; all social and business invitations stopped cold. (In fact, her husband now says, they've never resumed.)

''The Sweethearts of the Rodeo suffered because of that whole thing,'' says her singing sister, Kristine Arnold. ''The Sweethearts of the Rodeo never ever performed on the Grand Ole Opry again. We could say, 'Well, it was because of this or that,' but it was because of politics.''

Arnold says the divorce also caused the demise of Gill & Arnold, a Franklin clothing store that she and her sister owned for five years.

''We were just starting to get established and that whole horrible thing went down, and all of a sudden, a lot of our clientele that we were trying to establish suddenly didn't come and shop with us anymore.''

And still, that wasn't all that Janis had lost.

''Five years ago, I was a woman that was just totally stripped of self-confidence as a woman, as a person, as an artist,'' she says. ''Five years ago, I knew I was in trouble when I picked up the guitar and I realized the desire to play was dead. My guitar and I had been together since I was 8 years old. I told (Vince) one day, 'It's dead in me,' and it really killed him to hear that.''

With needle and thread

Janis Oliver was one of four children raised in Manhattan Beach, Calif., just outside Los Angeles, by a phone company executive and his homemaker wife.

''My first dream was to be a conductor of an orchestra,'' she says. ''My dad surprised me one day and bought me a real conductor's stick. My best friend Kim accidentally stepped on it and cracked it.''

She first studied classical music and soon broadened her interests to encompass bluegrass, western swing and rock.

In 1973, she and sister Kristine formed Sweethearts of the Rodeo, a name they borrowed from a 1968 Byrds' album. They were performing in a local pizza parlor when they were discovered by Emmylou Harris, who invited the women to open for her at the Roxy in L.A. They soon became popular on the West Coast bluegrass circuit.

Janis met Gill when the Sweethearts played a show with Gill's group, Pure Prairie League. They married in 1980 and moved to Nashville in 1983.

Like most financially strapped aspiring musicians, they made do with what little they had for themselves and their daughter, Jenny.

''I was sewing Jenny's clothes and I made Vince's Hawaiian shirts that he liked performing in,'' she says. ''We had no money! I would go to the marked-down table of Wal-Mart, where you could get fabric for $1.77 a yard. I would challenge myself with how I could take something from this table and turn it into something you could wear onstage.''

Initially, Janis' career surpassed her husband's. After signing a deal with Columbia Records, The Sweethearts' first two albums scored seven top-10 singles, including Midnight Girl/Sunset Town in 1986 and Chains of Gold in 1987.

It was the fruits of her songwriting that paid for the couple's first home. Gill, meanwhile, signed a solo deal with RCA in 1983, but he didn't find any real success until 1989, when he released the million-selling When I Call Your Name.

''I was happy that he finally took off because I was pulling for him from the start,'' she says. ''And I always felt really guilty about me getting my break first, because even before I dated Vince, I knew he was going to be a huge star. Everybody did.

''When he got his big break, I was honestly relieved, because he was getting ready to give it up. He was going to be a musician and do sessions and write. He said, 'I'm going to pack in this artist thing,' and I was worried about that. When he reached his big break, he just took off and there was no turning back.''

Since the couple had a small daughter, Janis decided to scale back her career so she could be home more.

''I remember sitting down with our management team and them saying, 'You're not giving this your all. We know you've got kids, but your competition isn't staying home with their kids.' My sister and I looked at each other and said, 'OK, and your point is?' We just shrugged our shoulders and said, 'We're not going to make that compromise.'

''I look back now and I'm very grateful for the success we did have, because we did consciously make that decision and we just thought, 'So be it.' We never really wanted to be superstars. Our goal was to make some records together and be proud of them.''

Rumors and innuendo

Janis says the first person who told her the rumor that Gill was seeing Grant was her daughter, a seventh-grader at the time.

''I said, 'Oh, honey, that is the funniest thing I've ever heard! Do you know what the word 'integrity' means? Look it up and you'll see their faces. Those two are two of the most upstanding people in our community, so that's funny that you would hear that.'

''We ended up laughing about it. 'She is a Christian singer and he's Mr. Nice Guy. He is a family man. His whole belief system is based on that.' I got her to see how silly that was.''

A year later, she was confronted by the rumors a second time when her housekeeper attended Vince's concert, but she refused to believe those, too. Arnold says Janis remained in denial until 1996, when she found a note from Grant to Gill that said, ''I love you.'' (Arnold, who first disclosed the letter to People magazine in 1999, cannot discuss it because of a confidentiality agreement in the divorce settlement.)

''One day, I looked outside my window and there was Janis' car sitting in my driveway,'' Kristine says. ''I walked outside and opened the door and said, 'What's going on?' She looked like somebody had died. She had a letter crumpled up in her hand and she handed it to me and said, 'Look what I found in Vince's golf bag.' That's the way it all started.

''It was like somebody took the rug and ripped it out from under her feet, because she was totally in love and totally dedicated to her marriage at that point. So we started trying to make excuses, 'Well, maybe this' or 'maybe that. Maybe it isn't what you think.' But it went from bad to worse.

''Even though she kind of knew what was going on, she basically forgave him, but he didn't want that; he wanted out. And so imagine the emotions that it takes on you; you have been married for 17 years, you have a family and suddenly it's over.

''For the next two years, it was a nightmare. I basically gave her a pep talk every time she called me: 'You're beautiful, you're talented, you don't deserve to be treated like this.' It really took her up until just recently to completely start rediscovering herself in a lot of ways.''

Her self-esteem took a beating during the last few years of her marriage. As her husband's desire waned, she began to feel undesirable.

''The more I talk about how hard I tried in that marriage, the more foolish I feel,'' she says.

Emotions erupt

In 1996, she filed for divorce, which thrust her even more into the spotlight. The tabloids paid for stolen divorce documents, so every legal maneuver was publicized.

But that attention was nothing compared to what she received when she went to stores or restaurants. ''People would either stare and poke each other or just come up and hug me,'' she says. ''I don't know how many times strangers would come up and give me a full-on hug and pat my back and say, 'You hang in there. You're going to be OK.' Sometimes it was helpful, sometimes it made me feel humiliated.

''People would come by the store and leave cards and letters. Sometimes I couldn't come out because I just knew I would start to cry. I would find people following me around, just whispering.''

Through it all, she leaned on Jenny. ''She would come home to me and say, 'Guess what happened today?' She wasn't mad; we would laugh about it. It was like, 'Get a life, people.' ''

And the wagging tongues that had kept the rumors fanned for years continued on.

''People said things to me about Amy, and they weren't very nice things,'' she says. ''I think people were just trying to help me, but they assumed I wanted to hear bad things about Amy, and I did not. I've gotten to know her much better. In a very difficult, awkward situation, she and I had many heart-to-heart talks. Really, I have a great deal of admiration for her.

''Whoever did what and why is another thing, but it still hasn't been easy on anybody, and she's taken a lot of responsibility. I really think a lot of her for that, because it's not easy for her to do that. Of everyone in the whole situation, I think the most of her, honestly.''

Although deeply hurt by losing the friendships of musicians and executives she had known for 20 years, she says she doesn't blame anyone, except perhaps herself.

''During the divorce, I just disappeared like a turtle in a shell,'' she says. ''I'm sure it's my fault for hibernating. I was so incoherent during those times because I was so upset. There would be dear friends that I would run into at restaurants and I didn't recognize them because I was so out of it, upset and embarrassed.

''After a while, I just couldn't bear to go out there. There are probably some people out there that I ran into that thought I was a goner. The more I tried to talk normally, the worse I sounded, so I just gave up and stayed home.''

At home, she faced a very angry teenage daughter, who lived with her throughout the divorce.

''She wouldn't even talk to her father,'' she says. ''He would probably never believe this, but I had arguments with her telling her she had to talk to him, she needed to see him and spend time with him. I did not want her to lose a father.

''She was very angry with me, too, and I didn't understand why for a while until it dawned on me one day that she hated seeing me such a victim,'' she says. ''It made her sick to her stomach and she later on admitted that to me. During those times when Jenny and I first moved out, it was a big deal if I could get out of bed and get my child off to school.

''The one thing I regret is that I was not able to be more coherent and there for her. We had a rough couple of months because she wanted me to get out of bed and tell him (off). She wanted me to do that and I couldn't do that; I wasn't able to.''

Jenny acknowledges, ''It was a weird situation to go through. I'm just glad I was old enough to understand, even if I acted immature sometimes. I didn't want to deal with it when it was happening, so I just kind of strayed from my parents. But it worked out for the best.

''I have two new families I love to death. Everybody gets along now, and we're lucky that it has worked out the way it has.''

But the happy ending didn't become clear for a good while. A Jehovah's Witness, Janis turned to her faith, but it wasn't enough at times.

''I think my severe depression overrode that,'' she says. ''People of all faiths would say to me, 'Just pray about it.' But I was so depressed, I couldn't pray. I felt so alienated for a while that I couldn't go to the meetings even. When I moved into this gated property, there would be two weeks that I wouldn't leave . . . because I felt protected here and it was a way of not dealing with things.''

Fate on horseback

Throughout her divorce, she found comfort in her horses, which offered her love and affection, confidentiality without judgment.

''In 1996, I had a paint horse,'' she says. ''I bought him to ride, but I ended up talking to him. I would just sit in that stall and cry my heart out. He would just stand there and look at me and let me hug him.''

She hit rock bottom on Oct. 1, 1997, when a serious riding accident left her hospitalized for 10 days with a broken wrist, broken ankle and neck injuries.

There was, however, a bright spot in this valley of desperation. On the day of the accident, she had been riding with Roy Cummings, whom she had hired to manage her farm. He put the seriously injured Janis behind him on his horse; he leaned far forward so she'd be able to sit up straight.

''I had just moved into my own place when the accident happened,'' she says. ''I was by myself for the first time in 20 years in a new place. I was lying in the hospital thinking, 'OK, you're getting a divorce, you're in a walker and you're going to be OK.' ''

But then five doctors entered her room and circled her bed.

''This one doctor said, 'Mrs. Gill, we are concerned. You have pneumonia, you are severely anemic and we think you need a blood transfusion. We know that your personal life is in upheaval.' I looked at them and said, 'But I'm really getting better.'

''After they left, I thought, 'Is it going to get any worse than this?' I think the worst thing was when I woke up — I was on morphine — I found out a 'fan' had gotten in and left a pornographic card and message on my bedside with dirty, unwrapped candy. That was the low point.''

While she recuperated and occasionally ventured out on friendly movie dates with Cummings, she still had to complete her divorce, which was ''heated and nasty.''

The terms of the settlement, which include a five-year confidentiality agreement that ends in June, give her 38% of any future royalties derived by songs Gill wrote or recorded during their marriage. The settlement is estimated to be worth more than $10 million.

''About three years ago, my sister said, 'You are the wealthiest and most unhappy person I've ever met,' '' Janis says. ''That says it right there. I do have a certain amount of wealth and I'm very grateful for that, but I have been so depressed.''

And no amount of money, she says, compensates for tearing apart a family. While she makes money on Gill songs that she hears on the radio, it doesn't lessen the pain.

''Some songs that come on the radio still break my heart,'' she says. ''I can pretend like they don't tug at my heart or make me wistful, but there are some songs I can't listen to anymore, like I Still Believe in You, because of the circumstances around them and what he told me they meant to him. To hear that now is confusing.

''Then there are other songs where I can look back now and I know who they are about and they aren't about me, and some of them go way back.''

She says it ''gets old'' to see Gill and Grant in the media.

''I've been mad, I've been upset, I've been hurt,'' she says. ''I've been all of those things, but now I would say that I'm just so disappointed.

''Sometimes I think, 'Why do I still live here?' But I think I can get to a point where I can just laugh all of that off. Sometimes I'll pick up the paper and giggle, and Vince calls me and we talk. We're friends, and he's so sweet to me on the phone. He still calls me 'Buddy;' he's called me that forever. He's very respectful and kind to me now, and so, you know, that's good. That's really good.''

What doesn't kill you …

It turns out she found music, and love, again.

She began writing songs again and has recorded a demo that she hopes will land her a record deal with an independent label. Tapping into her long-held desire to be a producer, she's attending engineering classes with students the age of daughter Jenny, now 20.

She's also begun two books, an autobiography that won't just be a bitter kiss-and-tell (she was going to call it Look at Us, but she's reconsidered) and a book of prose. She married Cummings, a tall, handsome, 39-year-old horse trainer, in 2000.

''I feel like it's a new chapter,'' she says. ''It's like completely reacquainting myself with the young woman with the brazen, nothing-can-stop-me attitude that I had,'' she says. ''Where in the world did that woman go? I'm thrilled that I'm getting back in touch with who that person was.

''I was always so conscious of how people perceived me as an artist, but much more importantly than that, as a wife and mother. I wore my marriage like a badge. Anything else that was going on, like a career, I always felt, 'Well, I can go back to that. One of these days I'll give it my full attention.' Before you know it, 20 years has gone by.''

Arnold says that Janis has become stronger and wiser for her experience.

''She is now very happily married and she seems to be very well-centered. She is vibrant and very generous and she has this creative energy that is starting to flow very heavily with her.

''How does a vibrant, beautiful woman lose the man that she's in love with and feels passionate about? You've got to carry those fears and doubts, and I think that stuff will never go away.

''But Janis is very strong and generous and forgiving. What else are you going to do? You can't carry it around with you. You have to forgive and go on.''

The songbird is free

Janis Cummings spends little time looking back now because she's planning for the future.

Now writing the most mature, introspective songs of her life, she was ready to launch a solo career when she recently decided instead to reunite with her sister for a new Sweethearts of the Rodeo album and tour. They'll record an album by early winter, shop it to interested record labels and then tour to promote it next spring.

''I never thought I would say this about our working together, but we're calling this a 'comeback album,' '' she says. ''I never thought we would ever step away from it. It's very exciting for us. There were a couple of years these past years where we seriously wondered if we'd get the opportunity to record again.''

After this duo album, which will likely coincide with the release of her autobiography, she'll revisit embarking on a solo career. For the first time, she's ready to take center stage and have others back her up.

Personally, she's stopped being a silent partner and become an equal one; she's a different person in this marriage, she says.

''If I'm in love, I tend to totally give myself away, 'Here take me, take all that I am,' and I'll try to be every type of woman there is for you. I've learned with Roy that taking care of myself and retaining my goals and doing what I want actually ends up making me a more interesting woman. I've learned not to tie my existence on Earth purely for him; I have things I want to do,'' she says.

''I don't think I'm ever going to do anything I don't want to do again. That's a big change in me. . . . The second biggest thing is the peace in my life and household right now. It's a very peaceful household and that's something new.''

It's a change her daughter has noticed as well.

''Her attitude has changed,'' Jenny says. ''There was a rough time, obviously, that we went through. Now that she doesn't feel lonely anymore, she's changed on the outside and she's changed on the inside. She's happy and not afraid to show it.''

Janis and Roy just bought a condo in Taos, N.M., where she enjoys the anonymity that eludes her in Nashville.

''Darned if I didn't have some really nice friends there who immediately made me feel like they like me and they thought I was a fun person to be with,'' she says. ''They didn't know who I was.''

What does Vince say?

Vince Gill did not respond to requests for an interview for this story or to questions sent to his publicist, a policy that has been consistent through the years since the divorce.

Link

"Amy Grant & Vince Gill" by Kevin McCullough
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Posted on Sep 23, 2002



RFM NEWS GUEST COMMENTARY
by WYLL Radio's Kevin McCullough
Chicago, Illinois
www.RFMNEWS.com
Dan@rfmnews.com

Paradoxical behavior sometimes tolerated by people of faith and conservatives

"And let me be really clear here. By sleeping with someone who is not your husband and, in fact, when that person you are sleeping with is actually someone else's husband, YOU are jeopardizing the health and stability of not one, but two families."
- Kevin McCullough -

"Amy Grant & Vince Gill" by WYLL Radio's Kevin McCullough

In Chicago this weekend, Amy Grant & Vince Gill were raking in dollars from conservatives and people of faith!

"Oh just go listen to her, Kevin, give her chance," came the considerable urging of my friends.

So, Saturday night, there I am, finding myself winding the back roads of Rosemont, Illinois, trying to get to "the event" for the weekend...Amy Grant and Vince Gill live in concert. Arriving, just on time, getting to my seat, which was about 18 rows back of center stage, I had just enough time left to say "Hi" to a few friends sitting nearby. One of whom could not resist.

"Kev! Surprised to see you here!"

"Well, hey, the opening act looks good and we'll see what happens," was about the only response I could muster up.

Okay, a little history for you.

Amy Grant has been doing "Christian" music for over eighteen years. Throughout her early days, I became a fan and faithfully bought every record/tape/cd she made. At a previous station where I worked, coworkers regularly tried to "stump" me by seeing if I knew a vague line of lyric from one of her albums. I was seldom stumped. As a young man, wanting to put positive messages into my brain, I found Christian music to be the kind of reinforcement I needed to make my choices. Amy's music was positive, fun and upbeat. She literally "began" an entire genre of commercially successful music, and many Christian musicians since owe their commercial success to the lady that really did make it popular.

Amy Grant enjoyed a parallel stream of success in pop music as well. Some of her songs, centering more around the idea of positive relationships, were added to pop radio's playlists and soon Amy stood on a platform amongst Christian recording artists that was truly head and shoulders above all others.

Many conservative-minded people were the ones buying Christian music, Grant's included. And as the eighties gave way to the nineties, conservatives and people of faith made Christian music the fastest growing music in terms of sales increases and in new radio formats hitting the dial. The term "CCM" (Contemporary Christian Music) became a more regularly known term and the groups in CCM (Michael W. Smith, D.C. Talk, Jars Of Clay) became stars.

Through it all, no one benefited more than the lady who was already sitting atop the heap.

In the nineties, there were troubles for Grant as well. Her longtime marriage to the man who wrote her very first number one song, Gary Chapman, was shaky. Her independence, wealth and lack of accountability did not really create for her any need to try and salvage the marriage. The marriage was dissolved and Christian music's number one star, and someone who had avoided the ugly headlines that two other troubled Christian music artists, Sandi Patti and Michael English, had lived through, seemed to be at peace with herself and the world around her.

But, over time, the truth was known.

Amy soon married country crooner Vince Gill. Amy and Vince, as far back as the early days of the nineties, had become friends, but as her own music betrayed her. The two were soon "deeply in love."

I remember being a music director at a radio station when her single came out titled, "It Takes A Little Time." Having been tipped off as to the "close friendship" that Amy and Vince were experiencing, having seen her credit him on the CD's credits--with no mention of her husband, and after listening to the lyrics of that song, which should never have been released to Christian stations, made it all too clear. Amy Grant was experiencing a marriage that was dying. And it was dying, in part, because of her refusal to give up an illicit relationship, a relationship strictly forbidden by the faith that she had proclaimed from the stage for so many years.

And let me be really clear here. By sleeping with someone who is not your husband and, in fact, when that person you are sleeping with is actually someone else's husband, YOU are jeopardizing the health and stability of not one, but two families.

In her own song, "Love Will Find a Way," Grant wrote the lyrics for a woman responding to a letter concerning marital infidelity.

As Amy came out on the stage at the concert Saturday night here in suburban Chicago, she did lots of her old songs. Sometimes, I would catch myself reliving moments and places in my life based on what song she was singing.

She did the song "It Takes A Little Time," and like a knife through my heart, I was back in my old office, holding that CD for the first time and with some fairly horrific feelings inside.

People of faith, and conservatives in particular, were outraged when a nation's President would let an ogling intern give him unspoken pleasures. People of faith criticized Hillary for allowing his philandering to continue. People of faith were further outraged when that President lied to cover it up.

People of faith and, yes, even conservatives, were some of the 49 people lined up outside the Mishawaka, Indiana, police station as Madelyne Toogood was brought in for beating her four year old daughter Martha. She was caught when the beating was filmed on a security video tape. In one interview, a lady waiting for the car carrying Toogood to arrive said, "I just want to give her a piece of my mind for treating her kid like that."

people of faith were, by the thousands, filling seats in suburban Chicago Saturday night, applauding Amy as she raved about what a "good" man Vince Gill was. People of faith are seen as double minded when we condemn Madelyne Toogood for slapping her kid around in the car--and then say nothing when the children of one marriage must now be split between three or more homes.

People of faith get pummeled because we have People of faith sometimes wonder why an outside world looks at them as though they are hypocritical. Well, let's remove the "wondering" from the scenario. Others look at people of faith as hypocrites because while President Clinton is booed for engaging in illicit and immoral behavior (as he should be), yet to step up to the plate.

Or, then again, have we?

I left the Grant concert early to avoid any more of Ms. Grant's glib comments about her formerly adulterous husband who is now a "good" man.

I got home just in time to see Miss Illinois Erika Harold be named Miss America 2003 on national TV. Throughout her pageant life, Erika Harold has been an unashamed Christian who encourages young people to live moral lives. Erika, through her own example, encourages kids to abstain from sexual activity until marriage and, once married, to live monogamously for life (note to Ms. Grant).

Erika Harold genuinely lives out of her faith. The new Miss America says she hopes to run for office someday. I hope she does.

In my opinion, it is time to replace high profile personalities who have an obligation to live morally. And that goes for politicians, as well as singers.

And did I mention that Miss America sings, too?

the Christian community as a whole. Don't think so. From what I have seen most of the Christian community is very supportive of Amy, especially those in Christian music.

Unlike some people, everyone who has ever met Amy and those who know her say she is one of the kindest people around.

I just found some other blogs where people have discussed Amy's divorce as well as Jaci Velasquez's. I got tired of harping about people in the public eye getting divorced. It never even dawned on me that they should step down from their so called ministries. If the Lord has told them that they should stay where they are (which I don't know) why I should tell them to step down. The Lord can still use them as singers, whether you like it or not. There are plenty of people in churches today who have done similar things and are doing similiar things-and they aren't in the public eye. They didn't get the idea from Amy Grant Or Sandy Patty. Kirk Franklin recently admitted he was caught up in pornography while he was married to his beautiful wife. I was shocked because I thought he was talking about years ago. No this was more recently, and all while a singer of gospel music. Clay Cross admited and wrote a book about being into pornography while being a Christian singer. A lot of people say Amy Grant never apologized or asked for forgivness or admitted any wrong doing. Just because I didn't hear it doesn't mean she didn't do it.

Everything you printed I've heard before. It's all old news.

You can respond, but I won't read it. I've heard enough. I'm tired of Christian critics.
I'm so thankful that the Lord is still pouring out his grace and mercy on all of us, because we all sure do need it.

As I said, if the Lord didn't tell Amy Grant to step down, why should you. She'll have to answer to him one day, just like the rest of us.

I look at Amy and Vince's careers. Seems neighther one of their carreers have been doing too well since they each got divorced and then got married. Ever Since "heart in Motion' and "baby Baby", Amy's records sell less and less. Vince's last record didn't do well either. Maybe the Lord is allowing that for a reason. How much longer they will be able to keep on singing is beyond me.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: tanyabell,

Tanya, you are correct that the copious amount of media reports cut and pasted onto this forum are not only old, they are very old, with the youngest being no more current than 2003. (I did notice that Gary's recent bankruptcy and pending lawsuits and accusations that he attempted to defraud his creditors were not pasted here (and isn't non-payment of debt a pretty serious sin, too?)and neither were Vince's poignant comments about Amy as he was inducted into the Songwriter's Hall of Fame this summer where he stated he felt his 30 year journey as a musician "was just to find her...and when she smiles at me the world is perfect, and I'm in the best place I've ever been." Divorce is awful but it touches the lives in one way or another, of virtually everyone and unless you're on the inside of the marriage, it's all like watching the war in Iraq on television. What we glimpse in this article or by that individual's opinion does not a fully-orbed view of what's actually going on, particularly in the marriage, make. For those of us who have been married long enough to have had serious problems and survived them, even we can say with certainty that marriage is really hard and there are no guarantees and as one wise person said to me recently, "most of us stink at it." People change. Stuff happens. There are such things as emotional issues and baggage going on behind the scenes and really, none of us on the outside are in a position to judge or even rebuke unless that particular individual is a member of our denomination or church and we're on the board evaluating their circumstances for the purposes of church discipline based upon in depth, inside information from objective sources like trained psychologists and superiors working with these individuals. I know so many wonderfully committed Christians who tried with all they had and then some, but couldn't save their marriages for one reason or another, many of them ministers, still preaching right now from pulpits or teaching in seminaries in mainline -some very conservative- denominations who, according to doctrine and polity believe that while divorce is extremely serious, it happens and it doesn't negate every gift a leader has to share. The pastor of the largest (several thousand members) Baptist church (SBC) where I live is divorced. He remarried his wife several years (like 5) after the divorce but during those first 3 years years he was a lonely father seeing his daughters on weekends and mailing child support checks, yet he never lost his position in the pulpit -thanks to caring, understanding parishioners- even though everyone who knows him will tell you that he admits the breakdown of the marriage was his fault and not his wife's even though she's the one who "technically" filed. I know this because he freely shared it with me AND also admitted in the early months, even for a couple of years after the divorce, he was unable to admit his own part in the divorce.(this may be very much the case in Gary Chapman's angry comments in his CCM interview months after his divorce was finalized. If he's mature at all, he probably has a different take on it now.) I also know this successful pastor feels the hypocrisy that exists on the issue of divorce in his own denomination is nothing short of scandalous. One pastor keeps his job, another is run out of town. Wives who leave loveless marriages to workaholic husbands when they must choose between the sin of committing suicide and abandoning their children because their depression has become so severe or the sin of getting a divorce after all attempts at counseling and discussion and a change in the negative dynamic of the marriage have been rejected, are still publicly shunned or emotionally eviscerated for all the world to see. No one ever cares about anyone's pain or how long they've lived with it, only who technically filed the papers and whose fault it was and who will taste the most delicious when publicly blamed and gossiped about. The truth? A divorce is usually everyone's fault. And more truth? Women -like Amy Grant- are usually hung out to dry more than men.

The problem I have with these critics is that "ruthless hypocrisy" I mentioned. They focus on this person, but not that person, and they're legalistic about this issue, but not that issue. I mean if you get down to it, you could go sift through those articles and quite easily pull up all kinds of inconsistencies to discuss that are also not quite kosher, like the fact that Janis Gill divorced Vince, or that she's a Jehovah's Witness, a group a die-hard fundamentalist (which I am not) would refer to as a "cult" thereby putting her on the level of an unbeliever who left her marriage, and I mean it just goes on and on and on. Amy Grant can't endure a painful marriage and get divorced but some other person the "critic" approves of could be doing considerably worse and yet experience none of the public wrath. It speaks volumes that Janis Gill would say Amy bore more of the responsibility (implying she even bore responsibility that wasn't hers) and that she really held her in higher regard than anyone else involved. But it wasn't convenient I suppose, to mention that because then it would blow a hole in the whole, "Amy and Vince are bound to rot in hell as they drag a jillion other gullible Christians with them." Please.

As to the careers of Amy and Vince, this isn't a giant mystery and their waning sales are not a "punishment" from God. The music business is based primarily upon youth and is notoriously, a fickle, fickle arena. Under 30 constitutes the largest group of buyers and no one stays at the top very long who appeals to that demographic. Amy's been recording nearly 30 years, she's almost 46 years old. Who consistently maintains stellar sales over that period of time in the secular world? Nobody. If Paul McCartney and Bruce Springsteen can't achieve it, neither can Amy Grant or Vince Gill. Both Amy and Vince had already hit their zenith in terms of success years before they married (or even became good friends) and after that, it's a downhill thing, part of the ebb and flow of life that all of us experience no matter what our profession. I rather admired Vince's take on it though, as he was encouraged himself and encourages others "to be as gracious on the way down as you were on the way up."

quote:

Originally posted by Lucie Manette:
Tanya, you are correct that the copious amount of media reports cut and pasted onto this forum are not only old, they are very old, with the youngest being no more current than 2003. (I did notice that Gary's recent bankruptcy and pending lawsuits and accusations that he attempted to defraud his creditors were not pasted here (and isn't non-payment of debt a pretty serious sin, too?)and neither were Vince's poignant comments about Amy as he was inducted into the Songwriter's Hall of Fame this summer where he stated he felt his 30 year journey as a musician "was just to find her...and when she smiles at me the world is perfect, and I'm in the best place I've ever been." Divorce is awful but it touches the lives in one way or another, of virtually everyone and unless you're on the inside of the marriage, it's all like watching the war in Iraq on television. What we glimpse in this article or by that individual's opinion does not a fully-orbed view of what's actually going on, particularly in the marriage, make. For those of us who have been married long enough to have had serious problems and survived them, even we can say with certainty that marriage is really hard and there are no guarantees and as one wise person said to me recently, "most of us stink at it." People change. Stuff happens. There are such things as emotional issues and baggage going on behind the scenes and really, none of us on the outside are in a position to judge or even rebuke unless that particular individual is a member of our denomination or church and we're on the board evaluating their circumstances for the purposes of church discipline based upon in depth, inside information from objective sources like trained psychologists and superiors working with these individuals. I know so many wonderfully committed Christians who tried with all they had and then some, but couldn't save their marriages for one reason or another, many of them ministers, still preaching right now from pulpits or teaching in seminaries in mainline -some very conservative- denominations who, according to doctrine and polity believe that while divorce is extremely serious, it happens and it doesn't negate every gift a leader has to share. The pastor of the largest (several thousand members) Baptist church (SBC) where I live is divorced. He remarried his wife several years (like 5) after the divorce but during those first 3 years years he was a lonely father seeing his daughters on weekends and mailing child support checks, yet he never lost his position in the pulpit -thanks to caring, understanding parishioners- even though everyone who knows him will tell you that he admits the breakdown of the marriage was his fault and not his wife's even though she's the one who "technically" filed. I know this because he freely shared it with me AND also admitted in the early months, even for a couple of years after the divorce, he was unable to admit his own part in the divorce.(this may be very much the case in Gary Chapman's angry comments in his CCM interview months after his divorce was finalized. If he's mature at all, he probably has a different take on it now.) I also know this successful pastor feels the hypocrisy that exists on the issue of divorce in his own denomination is nothing short of scandalous. One pastor keeps his job, another is run out of town. Wives who leave loveless marriages to workaholic husbands when they must choose between the sin of committing suicide and abandoning their children because their depression has become so severe or the sin of getting a divorce after all attempts at counseling and discussion and a change in the negative dynamic of the marriage have been rejected, are still publicly shunned or emotionally eviscerated for all the world to see. No one ever cares about anyone's pain or how long they've lived with it, only who technically filed the papers and whose fault it was and who will taste the most delicious when publicly blamed and gossiped about. The truth? A divorce is usually everyone's fault. And more truth? Women -like Amy Grant- are usually hung out to dry more than men.

The problem I have with these critics is that "ruthless hypocrisy" I mentioned. They focus on this person, but not that person, and they're legalistic about this issue, but not that issue. I mean if you get down to it, you could go sift through those articles and quite easily pull up all kinds of inconsistencies to discuss that are also not quite kosher, like the fact that Janis Gill divorced Vince, or that she's a Jehovah's Witness, a group a die-hard fundamentalist (which I am not) would refer to as a "cult" thereby putting her on the level of an unbeliever who left her marriage, and I mean it just goes on and on and on. Amy Grant can't endure a painful marriage and get divorced but some other person the "critic" approves of could be doing considerably worse and yet experience none of the public wrath. It speaks volumes that Janis Gill would say Amy bore more of the responsibility (implying she even bore responsibility that wasn't hers) and that she really held her in higher regard than anyone else involved. But it wasn't convenient I suppose, to mention that because then it would blow a hole in the whole, "Amy and Vince are bound to rot in hell as they drag a jillion other gullible Christians with them." Please.

As to the careers of Amy and Vince, this isn't a giant mystery and their waning sales are not a "punishment" from God. The music business is based primarily upon youth and is notoriously, a fickle, fickle arena. Under 30 constitutes the largest group of buyers and no one stays at the top very long who appeals to that demographic. Amy's been recording nearly 30 years, she's almost 46 years old. Who consistently maintains stellar sales over that period of time in the secular world? Nobody. If Paul McCartney and Bruce Springsteen can't achieve it, neither can Amy Grant or Vince Gill. Both Amy and Vince had already hit their zenith in terms of success years before they married (or even became good friends) and after that, it's a downhill thing, part of the ebb and flow of life that all of us experience no matter what our profession. I rather admired Vince's take on it though, as he was encouraged himself and encourages others "to be as gracious on the way down as you were on the way up."

Lucie,

Your post is proof positive that the Christian community is completely caught up in all of the psychobabble this current world has to offer.
Instead of focusing on God's word, people now look to other people to give them an excuse to make selfish decisions. They don't call it the "me generation" for nothing, and it represents everything God calls us NOT to be.

Instead of addressing the real issues at hand, you continue to spew anything and everything that somehow gives people like Amy, Sandy and Michael an excuse for their decisions that are everything but biblical, while they make money off of us, singing about that very thing.
WHAT'S WRONG WITH THIS PICTURE???

Tug at my heartstrings - so Vince *feels* he has done all of this just to get Amy. Keep in mind he had already made a lifetime committment in front of God to another not to mention she had done the same with someone else...
Does this mean nothing, then? Please answer me!
Other wise, I think the majority of us are in the clear, have changed as people and have come across someone else along the way who will make us happier, so adios amigos and on to something new! Woohoo!!!
Pffftt! Marriage in God's eyes? No matter, anymore, right?

As far as Janis goes, you are right, she is a Jehovah's Witness, so, don't you think this was an opportunity for Amy to show her faith in an extraordinary light and to prove herself to be an example about the things she sings about instead of ripping the world out from underneath this "other woman's" feet only to "fulfill" her own worldly pleasure, not to mention those five innocent children who had no choice in all of this?

Please address my questions and tell me where I am wrong?!?!

No the Christian community just doesn't sit around and harp about things over and over, especially years after something happened.

Don't people have anything better to do. I think people like you do more harm to the 'cause of Christ then Amy and Vince with their divorces and marriage to each other.

If I ever meet Sandy Patty, I will apologize to her for being angry and bitter over what she did. She doesn't owe me an apology and neither does Amy.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: tanyabell,

quote:

Originally posted by guest7:

Please address my questions and tell me where I am wrong?!?!

Since you asked...

1. All ages are and have been "the me" generation. Read up on the Roman Empire lately? Hellenism? The Crusades? The Civil War? People have always been and will always be intrinsically selfish no matter when they lived or live. Divorce is not some new anomaly that began after the 1960s because everyone abandoned the Bible. Divorce was common in the days of Moses and common during the time of Christ and it is common today. The difference in these times has to do with the rights of women which were sorely lacking in all of the aforementioned periods. In biblical, Mosaic times a man could divorce his wife because she burnt his dinner. In Abraham's situation, he could send his "wife" Hagar (or will you make a distinction there as well and say she was only his concubine?) away at the whim of Sarah with only a bit of bread and some water which put her life and the life of her child in mortal peril with no thought to them at all. What was the reason he sent her away? Because Sarah was ticked off? You like very much to throw around, "God's Word," yet do you not realize that 1/2 of "God's Word," otherwise known as the Hebrew Bible and what would have been the "bible" of Jesus (not the Gospels because they weren't written yet) contains within the book of Ezra a massive, community divorce when the Israelites(looking for someone to blame for their troubles) divorced their foreign wives? Cruelly sent women and children packing who had committed no other offense except they were from other countries (with presumably foreign gods) and had been unlucky enough to get hooked up with an Israelite? That's in God's Word too. According to Paul though the unbelievers should be allowed to stay if they wish. Be careful, be very very careful with how you throw scripture around, for one might find just about anything in there to justify whatever it is they want to do regardless of the context in which it was written. The Bible is ever so much more than "a rule book" or a one-size-fits all collection of wisdom for rainy days. You can't-no matter how hard you try- take it and a handful of English words that show nothing of the culture, history or language of the time it was written in and expect to successfully plug into it each and every person and their complex situations like it's all one big math equation. The Bible is God's word, and it's also alive and it also, by the work of the Spirit through all ages, attends to the needs and the growth of the living.

2. Your second error is that you know none of the people involved yet venture to reduce their marriages of 16 and 17 years respectively, to a few magazine articles and a few fingers worth of quotes. By doing so you commit a most grievous offense against not only their marriages and their private circumstances but their very God-breathed humanity. Where were you when Amy was 19 and Gary lied to her for the first time? Where were you when Amy, self-esteem in tatters and terrified the world would find out about what her life was really like, stood up smiling to make ungrateful, unrealistic people like yourself happy for a couple of hours? Didn't you say you went to see her during the Unguarded tour? Well-documented as one of the most unhappy times of her life. Did you care anything for what she was going through behind the scenes? Did you and do you care anything about what Gary and other addicts go through? Were you around when Sandi Patty was sexually abused and scarred pyschologically from ever having a really healthy relationship with any man or when Jaci's parents divorced which traumatized her and the rest of the family and surely factored into her own recent problems? No you didn't, and no you weren't. In most every situation -divorce or otherwise- a whole history comes with each person that factors heavily into why they do what they do, why they feel what they feel and who they are. It's not "psychobabble" it's common sense. None of us exists in vacuum, who we are is connected to what happens to us, what we see happen to others, and how we process it emotionally and every other way. Best to stay clear of asserting too many "judgments" (for that's what they are) if you haven't been there every step of the way. Remember in the book of Job? His buddies(who had been around) came by to expound to him the reasons why he suffered? The first said Job suffered because he had offended God. The second said Job suffered because his children had offended God? And the third wasn't exactly sure except to say it was because of Job's guilt? (and we won't even get into Elihu, an arrogant youngling) Not one of them looked at Job, the man, with any care or consideration, instead, they rehashed his life looking only to uncover his sins, looked only to find out who it was that screwed up, who was to blame for his abysmal mess. And remember what God's response was towards them? Only if Job would pray for them would he forgive their stupidity and insensitivity and pretty shoddy theology.

3. You reduce marriage to a vow and nothing more. Marriage isn't words spoken with a shaky voice on one day of your life, it's all the moments, spoken, unspoken, physical, emotional, spiritual, parental, financial, social, educational, etc., etc., etc., after that day that makes the marriage. On that point, Amy was right, "Words are cheap and sometimes cruel and stuff you hear is seldom true..." Most of us don't know what the heck we're doing on the day of our weddings. We don't know what we're getting into or who that person really is or will become or who we are and will become. Can God work through all those things? Certainly! I've seen it and I've personally experienced it. Does it happen every single time? No. And not even God can change the past. Most of us are doing the best we can, making decisions using what we know, our experiences, our feelings, and yes, "God's word," but it isn't foolproof and none of it guarantees a happy-ending.

4. You seem to come from the perspective that happiness is of no value in this life whatsoever. It's like a slave mentality, "Yes I was born to suffer here but in heaven I'll get my reward." In fact, that's kind of your thing isn't it? It's either/or, black/ white with nothing in between. But you're foolish in this view for there are things in between, lots and lots and lots of things in between. Open your eyes and look around. Does a loving, merciful, forgiving God care nothing for that, nothing