Best-selling 'God' author faces plagiarism claim »
Posted By MyWayOnNow 10 months ago in ReligionNeale Donald Walsch, best-selling author of Conversations with God, said Tuesday he unwittingly passed off another writer's Christmas anecdote as his own in a recent blog post. As a result, Walsch's blog on the spirituality website Beliefnet.com has been shut down. The website said in a statement Walsch failed to properly credit and attribute material from another author.
Walsch had written about what he described as his son's holiday concert two decades ago in which children were to hold up letters spelling "Christmas Love." One of the children held the "m" upside down, so the audience got the message "Christwas Love."
Author Candy Chand said in an interview Tuesday she stumbled onto Walsch's post when she ran "Christmas Love" through an Internet search engine. She immediately recognized her own words, from her story based on her son's kindergarten Christmas pageant. She contacted Walsch and Beliefnet.
Walsch blamed the incident on a memory lapse. He had been telling the story for so many years, he argued, that he had "internalized" it. But Chand isn't buying. "It's pretty difficult for me to believe that someone has a memory lapse that is word for word my story," she said. (You can read Beliefnet's own statement on the incident, and some pro-Walsch comments from community members, here.)
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tadair91910 months ago
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Im actually sad that this happened. Conversations with God is probably the best book I've ever read in my life.
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Seriously. It's not for the fundamentalist. It's for the philosopher. It's for the people who question the world around them.
a measly $10, you can download the audio here:
http://www.audible.com/adbl/entry/offers/productPr... -
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Dionys10 months ago
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" My goodness, a Godly Christian caught lying and cheating. I find this so common it hardly warrants comment."
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My goodness, a Humanist Human caught lying and cheating...
It's human nature. Doesn't have much to do with him being a Christian. -
dibujohnkComment removed: Spam
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memestryker10 months ago
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It does NOT say she "had to run it through a search engine to remember herself." It says she just did a search for the two words.
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And yes, people want to get paid for their work. I would have contacted Walsch before contacting BeliefNet and closing him down.
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aspenrj10 months ago
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Really? You people are ridiculous. Unless the guy made money on it, who really cares??? Everyone who is talking about God's temper ought to take a long look at their own heart because I guarantee over the past few years, they have had equally or worse sins.
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mommdiana10 months ago
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I think a discreet e-mail to the person exposing his error and his apology to her would have been the way to go here. We have become a society of people who focus on the mistakes of others and try to bring them to their knees for it. Forgive and move on!
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Wbradley10 months ago
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To those of you wondering "who really cares?":
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Those of us who believe that honesty and integrity matter care. Neale Donald Walsch is a thief and a fraud, and he needed to be exposed. Candy Chand may be a writer of simple-minded pablum, but good for her for blowing the whistle on this creep. -
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lpjam110 months ago
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You know Pokeydoke, there are bad people out there everywhere, from every religeon and every walk of life. Some of you people seem to take glee out of a christian doing a bad thing so you can laugh at christianity and religeon. At what point did it become the "in thing" to hate religeon? Are we a population that has become so infused with athiesm that we've come to this? I wouldn't point at an atheist and laugh at his fall from grace and say "hah, he deserved it", I would pretty much just say he was a bad person or a good person doing a bad thing. We have lost so much moral ground because we aren't allowed to bring religeon into the public arena and in our schools.
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Newenglander10 months ago
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See Crabby O's comment below. Although I can't speak for Pokydoke this comment pretty much sums it up. You are correct when you say that there are bad people who represent all walks of life but I find many Christians to have a "I'm better than you" attitude when it comes to moral values and they all offer to pray for me. I find this particularly irksome. I am an Atheist and I do not use any form of organized religion. I do not care what anyone believes or doesn't believe but I strenuously object to people of religion trying to force their particular beliefs on me through legislation.
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acrasia03110 months ago
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lpjam1, it seems like Christians love to masquerade their agenda as a defense. Religion is not the target in America; it is Christian essentialism, this idea that only one faith has any validity. Nearly every religion has some version of the Golden Rule, love thy neighbor, etc. Your morals are being taught without the exclusivity of your own faith, so you've decided they somehow don't count. Of course the perceived outsiders are going to have a bit of schadenfreude when Christians fall from grace because those are the ones preaching that nobody else can be good if they are not saved, bottom line.
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newbaku10 months ago
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As a writer, my words are my bread and butter; intellectual property should not be "borrowed" this way, any more than my automobile should be "borrowed" by the kid down the street. Not without my express permission. He thought it was his own memory? Maybe its Alzheimers?
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ritrdoc10 months ago
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Did the original writer make money on this story before this incident? Could they have made money? I doubt it. Some might try to capitalize on this. I don't believe Walsch internalized it, forgot he had read it before. One thing for certain as a writer no matter if money were made or not, I would be angry my creation was stolen.
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memestryker10 months ago
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I don't know--anyone at mid-life starts forgetting more--it's part of the aging process. I suspect it was an anecdote he just picked up somewhere that was passed around and then the source finally gets wind of it. But now that the media have turned it into a firestorm, it will take on a life of its own.
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cushi10 months ago
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When I was in jr. high (middle school is what they call it now, I believe), I penned our alma mater as part of a group project. We were all told to write it and then pick the one we liked best. It just so happened that mine was picked. However, the chairman of our committee was the one who presented it to the teacher, who assumed it was her work and she never corrected that. She was allowed to introduce it to the entire school and received the honor and the credit for the song I wrote. I was very hurt and very angry at the time, and I even went to my teacher and said, she didn't write that, I did. It's my song. She pretty much told me, I don't believe you, "so and so" wouldn't do that. The rest of my group shrugged it off because they didn't care one way or the other as they didn't want to do the project in the first place. So, I became very frustrated and bitter and decided I would stop writing because I didn't want my work stolen and other people taking credit for it. It was an immature and short-sighted decision, but one that I made and stuck with for many years thereafter. Also, this person, who I had considered my friend, I resented and our friendship soured as a result.
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That was then, and this is now. Now, I realize that my "friend" did not gain anything in the long run but a guilty conscience. She never "wrote" anything else after that and her 15 minutes of fame faded. She had to live with the knowledge of what she did and what it cost her in the long run, not me. I no longer harbor the resentment of my immature mind over the incident, and until now, I had not even thought about it in recent years. If I were to encounter this person now, I would sincerely be able to smile and embrace her and be glad to see my old friend. No apology needed, I may have done the same exact thing if I had been in her place and the teacher had assumed somebody else's work to be mine. Everybody likes to be praised and well thought of...it's only human.
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uvray1310 months ago
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duhh...for one's own work, yes. Whether it be a sixth-grader reusing an older siblings book report, a college senior passing off a purchased term paper, or a respected professional writer "internalizing" someone else's maudlin little story, IT'S STEALING.
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regan40010 months ago
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Satan loves this stuff...I'm sorry for the lady whom the "story" really happened and I'm sorry for the guy who, I guess, wanted people to respect or to look up to tried to pass it off as his own. But, we're all missing the point...Christwas love...Christ IS LOVE...where is the love? All this "stuff" without love is as a resounding gong.
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meavh10 months ago
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I submit that this story is not even original to author Candy Chand. It is an event that took place even BEFORE Candy's son was born and you will find that story recorded and dated on the internet on a variety of search engines. How do I know? I am a pastor and I've used that story as an illustration and have used sources that pre-date Candy Chand's account. There is a short Christmas program for children that churches have used for many years titled "Christmas is Love" and in many a church program a kindergarten or preschool child has indeed held the "M" in ChristMas upside down so it reads to the audience as "ChristWaslove". I believe Candy Chand when she writes about the event at her son's kindergarten pageant. I am also saying that this same event has taken place in several pageants that have used the same resource to put on the pageant.
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pamelabritton2u10 months ago
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Actually, Xzavier187, I frequently Google my *own* story titles to see where they might turn up. It's a pretty common practice amongst authors.
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And Meavh, I believe the issue is that Candy's story--the story that she had taken the time to write down--was lifted word-for-word. If that is indeed the case, that's plagerism and has nothing to do with where the story originated from. I agree with you 100% that this is a common church practice and that it could have happened to *anybody*, but it's a moot point as far as the plagerism issue is concerned.
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pamelabritton2u10 months ago
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Actually, Xzavier187, it's a pretty common practice for authors to Google the titles of their stories. It's fun to see if people are talking about one of your books/articles. I suspect this poor woman was horrified to discover she'd been plagerized. I know I would be!
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CrabbyO10 months ago
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Why are we always criticizing the religious right when they screw up? Because they hold themselves up higher than the rest of us. As an atheist I've been told many times by these people that define themselves by their religion that I have no morals, and no sense of right and wrong because I don't adhere to their bible. So every time they prove to me that they don't either I find this to be newsworthy.
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Symbient10 months ago
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Curiosity Question .... I'm not very religious but why would you suggest that Christ is no longer love? What happened to these people .. both authors to send such a subliminal message.
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For many Good hearyed and Natures Christians - Christ is and always has been LOVE. Anyhoo .. just a thought on seeing the phase 'ChristWas Love' -
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Symbient10 months ago
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Curiosity Question .... I'm not very religious but why would you suggest that Christ is no longer love? What happened to these people .. both authors to send such a subliminal message.
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For many Good hearyed and Natures Christians - Christ is and always has been LOVE. Anyhoo .. just a thought on seeing the phase 'ChristWas Love' -
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