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"Do you have a grandmother?" she finally asked.

"Yes, she's dead, but yes," he said.

"If I spoke the words you're asking me to say, it would break my grandmother's heart," McCarthy said. "It would break my family's hearts. I love my family, and I would never do anything that is so dishonoring to them."

A professor in his 80s, to whom the rest of the group looked up, asked to speak.

"Our prophet Muhammad taught us Jesus was a great teacher," he said. "We know that Dr. Teri follows Jesus because she too is a great teacher. The Holy Qur'an teaches us that God hears the earnest and honest person who sincerely seeks him, whether they are in a mosque or a temple or a church."

He then turned to the man demanding what would amount to McCarthy's instantaneous conversion to Islam, and said: "Even Muhammad would not ask her to say that!"

The class broke out in applause, entreating the teacher to write the Qur'an verse on the board. They hurriedly copied down the reference. Bin Laden must have been turning in his grave—or cave, depending on where he is.

IICS likes to point out that the world's most wanted terrorist was once a student, and he too had a favorite teacher. In the September 24, 2001, issue of Time magazine, reporter Lisa Beyer speculated that September 11 might have gone differently had bin Laden "drawn a different teacher for Islamic studies rather than a charismatic Palestinian lecturer who fired his religious fervor." Now, in the very building where bin Laden once taught, freedom of religion was being preached jointly by a Christian and a Muslim.

Perhaps, in that moment, minds and souls of could-be bin Ladens were opened.

Agnieszka Tennant is an associate editor of Christianity Today.

Copyright © 2003 Christianity Today. Click for reprint information.

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December 2003, Vol. 47, No. 12