Virtually anyone linked to God and cyberspace gets the same letter several times a year as it\u2019s copied and forwarded, and copied and forwarded, from one e-mail list to another \u2014 World Wide Web without end, amen.<\/p>\n\n
It contains a \u201ctrue story\u201d about an atheistic philosopher at the University of Southern California, a courageous student, a piece of chalk and a miracle. The letter ends by challenging the reader to pass it on, rather than hitting the delete key. Clearly, readers are supposed to have enough faith to keep this evangelistic chain letter going.<\/p>\n\n
Well, the philosophy faculty at USC doesn\u2019t have enough blind faith to let this story keep making the rounds. In a few weeks the department will \u2013 after years of calls, letters and email \u2014 add a front-page link to its Internet site offering a pack of proof that the story simply isn\u2019t true.<\/p>\n\n
\u201cI don\u2019t think the people who keep sending this around mean any harm and I can understand why it appeals so much to some people, especially to some Christians, who often feel like they are treated poorly in academia,\u201d said Edwin McCann, director of the school of philosophy. \u201cBut if people fall for this story because it bolsters their faith, and pass it on, they\u2019re spreading around something that isn\u2019t true. Serious believers need to base their belief on truth.\u201d<\/p>\n\n
The most popular version of this tale describes an event that happened \u201ca few years ago\u201d in a required class that one professor annually dedicated to his belief that God could not exist. For 20 years, no student had dared to answer when he shouted, at the end of the semester: \u201cIf there is anyone here who still believes in Jesus, stand up!\u201d<\/p>\n\n
Then the professor would hold up a piece of chalk and challenge God to keep it from hitting the floor. Every year it shattered into tiny pieces. Finally, a freshman \u2013 after months of prayer \u2013 dared to make a stand. The professor called him a fool and proceeded to perform his famous chalk test. However, this time the chalk slipped, hit his shirt cuff, rolled down his leg and off his shoe \u2013 unbroken.<\/p>\n\n
\u201cThe professor\u2019s jaw dropped as he stared at the chalk,\u201d says the story. \u201cHe looked up at the young man and then ran out of the lecture hall. The young man \u2026proceeded to walk to the front of the room and share his faith in Jesus for the next half an hour. Three hundred students stayed and listened as he told of God\u2019s love for them and of his power through Jesus.\u201d<\/p>\n\n
The story usually arrives in a letter from someone who received it from a friend who knew someone who heard the story from another friend who knew a student who saw it happen.<\/p>\n\n
Meanwhile, McCann freely testifies that this hasn\u2019t happened during his 14 years at USC, or during the 32-year tenure of the noted Christian philosopher Dallas Willard. Plus, there is no required course that fits this description and the only class, in this era, that has had the same professor for 20 years doesn\u2019t address the issue of God\u2019s existence and so forth and so on.<\/p>\n\n
An epistle McCann will soon post online traces the story to a 1977 book called \u201c70 Years of Miracles.\u201d In that account, author Richard Harvey shares an anonymous account of an atheistic scientist who performs a similar classroom test of faith with a glass beaker \u2013 in the 1920s.<\/p>\n\n