God Save the Chalk

Recently, on Facebook, someone posted a link to a video that told the story about the atheist professor who challenged his students every year to pray to God to keep a piece of chalk that he dropped from breaking. The professor's logic was that God could easily accomplish such a feat but never did. Then one brave student stood up and, lo and behold, when the professor dropped the chalk, it rolled down his leg and got stuck in the cuff of his pants before rolling out onto the floor without breaking.

I pointed out to my friend that this was an urban legend and had probably never happened, but most assuredly did not happen in 1994 at USC as the video says. Her response was that it didn't matter whether it was true or false, it made you think. My response back was that it was deceitful for someone who claimed to be a Christian to post a video that was essentially a lie in order to recruit new members to a religion that claims to hold THE truth.

But as I thought about it, I realized that anyone who thought that this story made you think didn't really think at all! The story could be changed to any combination of faiths and it would still "work". Try it. Here's the link to the story on Snopes. Instead of an atheist professor, make him a Christian professor. And instead of asking if anyone still believes in Jesus or God, substitute "Odin". Or even "fairies", because they're reported to have magical powers! And everywhere you see "Jesus" or "God", substituted "Odin" or "fairies." And if you see the word "Christian", substituted "Odinist" or "fairy-believer". The story still works! It's not an earth-shattering lesson in the power of God. It's a "sleight of mind" that's meant to make you think it's logical and has sound reasoning. Far from making you think, it wants you to simply "ooooh" and "aaahhh" without thinking and accept what they say as fact instead of personal belief.

The flaw in the professor's logic lies in the fact that being able to do something doesn't guarantee that one is going to do something. There is no "evidence" that God wants to prove his (or her) existence to everyone. In fact, I believe just the opposite. I believe that God gave us free will. If he were to prove to everyone that he exists, then we'd no longer have free will to believe in him or not. (Just like we don't have free will to "believe" in gravity.) Faith is, by definition, belief in that which is beyond proof. You don't need faith if you have proof. God wants us to believe in him (or her) because we choose to, not because there's no other alternative. God will give us all the personal "proof" we want, but this subjective proof is no the kind of objective proof that the professor was looking for. It's not the kind of scientific proof that most atheists are looking for. But it's the kind of proof that allows believers to know that their faith is true for them. And, ironically, it's no longer a faith for them because they have their personal proof.